Of sheep turned wolves and UP’s ‘fightingest’ Maroons

It was a tough UAAP Season 86 and a heartbreaking championship game, at least for us, the Diliman faithful. We were so close, yet as fate would have it, the ball slipped through the Maroon boys’ hands in that epic ‘do or die’ game against the Green Archers.

As a stunned alumna, I cried for the first time in my life over a game of basketball. I wasn’t even affected when the UP Fighting Maroons had an unenviable record of 0-14 or 0 wins and 14 losses.

But Season 84, that summer of ’22 changed all of that and suddenly, for the first time in 36 years, we brought home the title. I could still hear in my head the sports commentator’s famous line…“10 seconds to play...UP, 36 years without a title... is this it?” And then JD Cagulangan made that three-point shot at the buzzer. 

The rest, as they say, is history.

We realized it was possible to be champions again. I guess it’s so much more than about basketball. It’s a story of perseverance; of a community coming together; of making dreams come true, your typical Isko and Iska story. 

It’s the reason why the loss is more crushing now and defeat, bigger than ever.

Last week at the dinner hosted by UP Fighting Maroons’ Queen Mother Robina Gokongwei to celebrate our valiant boys, UP Diliman Chancellor Edgardo Carlo Vistan II summed it up well when he said that suddenly, being champions became achievable and it became the expectation.

And because the UP Fighting Maroons showed the whole UAAP community what it could achieve, the enemies became tougher, too. 

As the Diliman faithful screamed and shouted “UP Fight!” our enemies’ battlecry became “Fight UP!” We had become worthy opponents.

During the dinner at Crowne Plaza’s Seven Corners, UP president Angelo Jimenez said something like from the depths of darkness, we are now in a brighter spot, recalling the team’s difficult journey. 

He was a student when UP won the championship back in 1986, which was 48 years in the making.

Prexy Jijil said that he has witnessed many historic moments in life – from marching on EDSA during the 1986 People Power Revolution to helping repatriate Filipinos in war-torn countries as a labor leader, but that 1986 UAAP championship, he said, is still