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Deep roster propels Harbour to a 'Five-Peat
By Jonas Terrado (June 5, 2008)

It's been a week since Harbour Centre captured an unprecendented fifth consecutive championship with a 3-1 series conquest of Hapee Toothpaste in the 2008 PBL Lipovitan Amino Sports Cup.

The series marked an overwhelming showing by the Batang Pier to puncture the hopes of the Complete Protectors to seek revenge from their huge collapse in the V-Go Extreme Energy Drink Cup finals.

Save for its Game 1 meltdown, Harbour was in cruise control throughout the best-of-five showdown, making quick adjustments, hitting key shots, and showing tremendous defense against the top guns of Hapee such as Gabe Norwood, Mark Borboran, and Larry Rodriguez.

'It was really an all-out team effort to get this championship,' said head coach Jorge Gallent during the team's victory party celebration. 'They made a consciousness of not making the same mistakes as in Game 1.'

And of course, the forefront of the team's attack was Jason Castro. The league and finals Most Valuable Player plugged it as his swansong, making drives to the hoop with ease and swiping every Hapee ballhandler in a cinch.

Castro's 19-point, 5.3-rebound, and 49-percent shooting averages earned him the nod as the best player of the finals series. But the 5-9 guard isn't alone as Harbour had the luxury of having not just one, two, or three players stepping up in each of the four games.

Pivotal Player winner Jeff Chan embarked on an 11-point average, including a shooting statistic of 46 percent from the floor. The former Far Eastern University sniper complimented the offense with his outside shooting, and like in Game 2, provided some defense in the third quarter to even up the series.

Another significant contributor was Jonathan Fernandez, another gunner who had made decent contributions in Game 2 and 3. The NU standout shot 42 percent from three-point region and helped seal a 2-1 edge with a nine-point fourth quarter performance for a 90-78 win.

Regular starting point guard TY Tang may have a dismal performance in the series, but Boyet Bautista resurfaced in two of the four games.

The diminutive guard from Letran College, a former understudy of Hapee head coach Louie Alas, Bautista took advantage of his starting role in Game 2, pouring 13 points on four triples and then in Game 4, when Harbour virtually sealed the title in the first half, he made a last minute show with 16 points, all in the second half.

Other solid contributors for the team were another Game 3 hero Beau Belga, short-work efforts of Edwin Asoro, and Al Vergara, who sparked the team with six points in the second quarter of the title-clinching Game 4 to pull away.

The vast lineup of head coach Jorge Gallent has made it a luxury for the team to have a bunch of players to join in Castro's fray, and also to make it miserable for opponents to make adjustments.

In the rich history of the league, the Batang Pier joins the likes of superpowers Tanduay Rhum and Welcoat Paints, two clubs who had combined for 12 titles, as the team with at least five titles. Like its predecessors, its team was filled with a group of stars and decent role players to built it as a strong title contender.

But, with several of the team's core expected to move on to the pros, and with Castro moving to Australia, it will be a hard task for the team to come up with a lineup that could bolster another strong run to the finals.

'It's going to be like the fourth one, we gonna build up from stratch,' said Gallent, who will likely to tap the services of the likes of Rico Maierhofer, Joferson Gonzales, and Benedict Fernandez for next season. 'We have to recruit the same way in order to keep up with the level of competition.'

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