St. John’s Institute Baby Falcons defeated University of St. La Salle-Integrated School Baby Stingers, 71-66, to claim their seven-straight championship in the 10-Under category of the Negros Occidental Private Schools Sports Cultural Educational Association basketball tournament at the West Negros University Gym, Sunday.

SJI’s victory overshadowed the 39-point output from Baby Stinger Judiel Cary Peñaflor, who was unstoppable in the lowpost and who almost delivered the win for the La Salle team.

But the defending champion Johnians kept their composure and executed a balanced offense in the endgame to retain the championship and register a rare 7-peat in the NOPSSCEA tournament.

The La Sallians were up 61-59 in the fourth quarter when they committed a technical foul that allowed SJI’s Joshua Benedict Baldonado to convert two free throws and tie the game.

From then on, the momentum shifted on to the SJI side as the Baby Falcons got six additional points from Scott Albayda, Kyle Andrada and Kenneth Alimpuyo for a 67-61 lead.

Peñaflor tried to reverse the outcome of the game and delivered five more points for USLS but his effort was not enough to overhaul the lead as Baldonado and Andrada scored the final points in the game.

Baldonado and Alimpuyo scored all the SJI points in the first quarter for a 14-8 opening quarter advantage even as Karl Miguel Besa delivered six points for USLS-IS.

At halftime, SJI’s lead was sliced in half at 30-27 as Peñaflor scored 15 points.

Peñaflor continued to anchor USLS’ offense in the third quarter and with teammate John Paul Uños adding six points managed to get within striking distance at 51-48 going to the fourth quarter.

Refusing to give in to the pressure, SJI managed to protect their slim lead and held on until the final buzzer to remain as champion.

Baldonado led SJI scorers with 22 points while Alimpuyo added 14, Bryce Chan scored 12, Kyle Andrada made 10 points, Gamboa picked up 5, Albayda shot 4, Anton Go and Enzo Jamero finished with 2 points each.

For the USLS-IS, Uños had 11 points, Besa added 7, Kamei Masaki scored 4, JB Aquino had 3 and John Limco chipped in 2 points.

Meanwhile, SJI missed out on a double victory as they bowed to West Negros University in the Aspirants division, 86-80.

Reuel Palma scored 11 of WNU’s last 17 points to lead his team to a back-to-back title.

WNU and SJI were tied at 69-all but Reuel Palma knocked successive corner dagger treys to grab the momentum in the endgame to WNU.

The Junior Falcons staged a final rally in the fourth quarter but Palma and Jaycee Adjei countered the attack to put the game away as SJI could only come close at 84-80 on the two free throws from Justin Javelosa.

Compounding SJI’s woes in the final minutes was the fouling out of point guard Jeruel Tagle just as the Junior Mustangs were on a roll.

SJI also missed on 17 free throws and committed crucial turnovers at several points in their rally to doom their campaign for a doublé championship.

Adjei had a game-high 27 points for WNU, Mark Russel Moragas delivered 20, Palma scored 8, John Paul Malayas drilled 14, and Mark Bryan Bandojo had 5 points.

Donn Spencer Lim paced SJI with 26 points as frontcourt players Kyle Chua and Joshua Magay had the same 11-point output, Javelosa and Jeruel Tagle made 8 points each, Paul Fuentebella shot 7 points, Ian Japzon with 5 points, Kish Suarez and Sam Solinap round up the scoring for SJI with 2 points apiece.*

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