Thomas Torres doesn’t want La Salle thinking about 14-0

MANILA, Philippines – After defeating the NU Bulldogs in dominant fashion and improving to 10-0 in UAAP Season 79, the DLSU Green Archers moved 4 wins away from becoming just the third team in the Final Four era to sweep the men’s basketball elimination round.

But even with history on the horizon, fifth-year starting point guard Thomas Torres doesn’t want his team thinking about that potential accomplishment.

“Actually no, we don’t want to think about that we’re undefeated. For me, I don’t want there to be that type of pressure,” he told Rappler after scoring 12 points against the Bulldogs.

“As much as possible, every game, we prepare coach’s game plan well. To be honest, we haven’t achieved anything yet, right? Every practice we want to be sharp and do what coach wants us to do so coming into the game, we’re prepared.”

Torres admitted that the idea of going undefeated could be a distraction for the team, which scored the most points in a UAAP game in 2016 against NU, whose defense is one of the best in the UAAP.

“I feel like it’s going to be a factor if we’re going to think about it, because if you think about it now, 10-0, that’s already big. So if we enter than in our minds, everything might change. The ball is round, you don’t know what may happen,” said Torres.

“And since we’re 10-0, everyone wants to beat us. So we need to be always sharp and prepared for our games.”

Against NU, a total of 14 players scored for La Salle which connected on 51% of their attempts and went 7-of-17 from downtown. The Green Archers were also dominant in the rebounding category, 51-24, and forced 24 Bulldog turnovers leading to 36 points.

“I feel like this game, we played well – we were able to play the defense that coach wants, we were able to share the basketball, and everyone contributed,” said Torres, whose team has a two-game lead on the loss column over FEU (7-2) for the number one seed in the standings.

“That’s a good thing coming into the next game, because everyone’s confident.” – Rappler.com