10th July 2007
By Ester C. Beatty
(Photo above shows the athletes in the first game of the best of three series with the new Philippine Honorary Consul, Mrs. Shemaine Bushnell-Kyriakides, Mrs. Popi Votsi, General Manager of Western Union, Akis of Keravnos Club and some of the Committee Members.)
24th June 2007 – Dell of Nicosia and Interorient Navigation of Limassol were not bothered with the soaring temperature reaching 40C today to play the final games of the championship. After two months of playing basketball every Sunday and with the heat gradually creeping up all the time, the Philippine Basketball League (Cyprus) 2007 is finally over! Donald Luzon scored 21 points and Ace Generoso chipped in with 15 as Interorient Navigation topped DELL 52-49 to claim the Philippine Basketball League 2007 title on Sunday morning in Nicosia. Both teams went basket for basket from the tip-off, but the Limassol side kept their cool in the last minutes of the game and deservedly captured the championship title.
During the post-game show, spectators were able to enjoy the performances of Wilma Dayrit, Karen Julongbayan as well as Homeboys and G-girls from Limassol who recently won the dancing competition for the Philippine Independence Day celebration. The organizing committee then presented a total of 13 awards, which was followed by serving of tasteful Filipino foods.
The best team uniform award was given to the team from Larnaca, while Jhovaline was awarded the Fair-play award. Miss Jennylyn Honrado, representing MoneyGram, received the PBL 2007 Muse award.
MoneyGram Team with their Muse Ms. Jennylyn Honrado who brought home the PBL 2007 Muse award
The youngest player award was given to Karl Yulongbayan of Interorient Navigation who is 13 years old, with the Best Coach award also heading to the Limassol side with Marvin Santos claiming it.
The Mythical Five Award was given to Jeffrey Sarimento of DELL, Donald Luzon of Interorient Navigation, Allan Paul de Leon of Jhovaline, Allan of Larnaca and Ronald Ramos of MoneyGram.
Interorient Navigation’s Donald Luzon also received awards for the MVP of the league and the Best Scorer. Jeffrey Sarimento of DELL was awarded as the player who scored the most three-pointers throughout the competition.
On the first series of the final, which was played on 3rd June 2007, DELL used a punishing final quarter to claim an important 69-56 victory over Interorient Navigation and take a 1-0 lead in the best of three series of the Philippine Basketball League 2007 finals.
Mrs. Shemaine Bushnel-Kyriakides, the new Honorary Consul of the Philippines, made an honorary tip-off which was greeted with a long applause by Filipino spectators. Among the guests of the organizing committee was also Mrs. Popi Votsi, the General Manager of Western Union in Cyprus who sponsored the league. After the final buzzer, the spectators had an opportunity to enjoy basketball even more when the selected team of the league faced the CyBasketball.com team in a game with many attractive moves. The CyBasketball.com team had the upper hand throughout the game eventually winning it 73-46.
Larnaca Team bags the Best Team Uniform award
In the second game of the league finals which was held on 17th June 2007, Interorient Navigation defeated DELL convincingly with the score of 55-37 and tie the final series at 1-1, while in the game for the third place MoneyGram demolished Larnaca 61-36.
After leading throughout the first half, the Limassol side almost let their lead slip away when allowed DELL to take the lead for the first time in the game towards the end of the third quarter at 27-28. When everyone expected DELL to take a complete control of the game in the final period Interorient Navigation came back strong scoring 26 points and holding their opponent on seven to win the game and force the deciding third game today.
The organizing committee would like to thank the following for their kindness and generosity for the success of the league: Western Union and G.A.P. Vassilopoulos Worldwide Removals for sponsoring the league, Keravnos Club for letting us use their court, Mr & Mrs Tony Kyriakides, Mrs Morena Pavlou, Mr Costakis Panagides, Messrs Photos Photiades, Lenia from Limassol, Aida of Boracay Club (Limassol) and to all the teams who provided foods and drinks during the celebration after the game. A game is not always possible without a proper referee, so we would like to say a big thank you to Mr Nemanja Bjedov, who has always shown his professionalism to all the players and was assisted by Mr Amin Houmayoun, for their help and assistance.Congratulations to all the players of each team for showing the true spirit of sportsmanship during the games. TAYO’Y MGA PILIPINO – MAGKAISA TAYO!!!
The Champions! InterOrient Navigation Team from Limassol
The referees Mr. Amin Houmayou and Mr. Nemanja Bjedov
This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 10th, 2007 at 4:50 pm and is filed under News.
You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
