It was a year of incredible ups and downs, of glorious victories and shattering misses, but 2010 stood out as a truly memorable year for the country?s finest athletes.
Manny Pacquiao won an unprecedented eighth world boxing crown in as many weight categories. Francisco ?Django? Bustamante finally landed the big one and ended the year as the world?s top-ranked pool player. Taekwondo?s poomsae men?s trio matched its female counterparts? feat in 2009 with a world title in Uzbekistan.
And to top it all, a hodge-podge of a football team fondly called Azkals exploded into the international scene in December, coming from nowhere to gift the once-minnows Philippines a fighting semifinal windup in the Suzuki Cup.
Here are our Top 10 stories of 2010.
10 PSC versus POC
Shaken by the discord between the Philippine Olympic Committee and the Philippine Sports Commission the previous year, the national team seemed headed for another disaster in the Asian Games.
While the POC headed by Jose ?Peping? Cojuangco Jr. was setting up a secretariat and criteria for the selection of athletes in the early months of 2010, former PSC chair Harry Angping had begun pin-pointing the athletes capable of winning a gold medal.
The enmity was fueled by the PH participation in the 2009 Southeast Asian Games in Laos where sports officials sent two teams?one financially supported by the PSC and other backed by the Olympic body.
Right after the fifth-place finish in the Vientianne Games, Angping started identifying the athletes who deserve all-out support in terms of training, allowances and foreign exposure for the 16th Asiad in Guangzhou, China held in November.
The sports-funding agency initially named eight athletes to the elite cast?bowling?s Biboy Rivera, Cecil Mamiit and Treat Conrad Huey of tennis, long-jumper Marestella Torres, karatedo?s Marna Pabillore, Wesley So of chess and swimmers Miguel Molina and Daniel Coakley.
Besides the special group, the PSC formed a training pool of 187 athletes from 19 sports after disbanding the previous group of roughly 600 athletes.
Angping later increased the number to 20, adding taekwondo-jins Tshomlee Go, Marie Antoinette Rivero, John Paul Lizardo and Marlon Avenido, among others, before he stepped down from office on July 1.
On the other side of the spectrum, the POC insisted on more Asiad slots as against Angping?s previous plan of sending only 80 athletes.
The POC-PSC conflict also spilled over into the leadership of some of the national sports associations.
Cycling has two claimants to the leadership throne and Cojuangco?s presidency in equestrian was challenged by former party-list representative Carissa Coscolluela.
The long-standing rift between the POC and the PSC abruptly ended with the entry of a new PSC chair in former commissioner Richie Garcia.
The POC sent 188 athletes in 29 sports in the Asiad, with the PSC funding their participation without question. The country took home three gold medals, four silvers and nine bronzes. June Navarro
9 Junior golfer, Mi?oza shine
Golf produced both the expected and otherwise in 2010, with the country?s most revered professional star and a pint-sized junior providing most of the stir.
Frankie Mi?oza crashed the United States? Champions? Tour roster by finishing second in the recent Q School in Florida, while Miguel Tabuena won the silver medal in the Guangzhou Asian Games last November.
?It was tough,? the 50-year-old Mi?oza told the Inquirer a couple of weeks ago after finishing third in the Philippine Open held at the Valley Golf Club in Antipolo, recalling how taxing Q School was.
?The heat out there (in Florida) was terrible. The weather here (in the Philippines) is far more comfortable.?
Making the Champions Tour marks another first in the career of Mi?oza, who will, starting this month, be ranged against the likes of future Hall of Famers Fred Couples, Bernhard Langer and Greg Norman, among others, in the chase for the richest prize in golf.
Winning a Major championship would give Mi?oza the distinction of becoming the first Southeast Asian player to do so and become the second Asian after Y. E. Yang of South Korea to triumph in any of golf?s four biggest tournaments.
Another pocket-sized bet, Ruperto Zaragosa II, won the Callaway Junior World 12-under title in San Diego, a masterful triumphed carved out after helping Canlubang win a record fifth straight Philippine Airlines Interclub men?s regular title in Bacolod.
Mi?oza?s feat came a couple of weeks after the eloquent Tabuena, a 16-year-old, surprised everyone in China by leading individual play in the Asian Games and eventually settling for the silver medal.
It was an unexpected romp by the teenager, who was seeing action in just his second men?s international event after gaining inclusion in the World Amateur squad in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Tabuena announced that his Asiad feat was no fluke by giving the pros, Mi?oza included, a run for their money in the PH Open, with eventual winner Artemio Murakami declaring him ?the best young talent I?ve seen in years. Even better than me when I was his age.?
Murakami was a multiple winner in the season that ended, triumphing in Thailand in the Asian Tour?s version of the Q School.
Juvic Pagunsan and Angelo Que, regarded as the country?s top two pros, didn?t actually win big international events but still made waves both here and abroad.
Pagunsan, the Asian Tour?s top rookie in 2007, won the Riviera and Apo legs of the ICTSI Tour. Que, on the other hand, won the rich and exclusive The Country Club Invitational for the second time in his career before continuing in his quest to play in the Majors and remaining as a legitimate force in the Asian Tour.
The Philippine Amateur produced another young winner in Clyde Mondilla, who made the most out of his familiarity with the Del Monte layout in Bukidnon to beat the finest players in the ranks. Musong R. Castillo
8 Davis Cuppers stay in Group 1 With crunch time experience and a little luck, the Philippines narrowly managed to stay in Davis Cup Group 1 this year.
The Cebuana Lhuillier-Philippine Davis Cup team, built around Cecil Mamiit and Treat Huey, suffered heavy defeats at the hands of Japan (0-5) and Chinese Taipei (1-4) earlier in the year, putting the country in the brink of Group 1 elimination.
Last September, the country even tottered toward getting relegated when a youthful Korean squad pushed the Nationals to the wall by taking both the opening singles in Changwon.
Nineteen-year-old Yong Kyu Lim opened with a hard-fought 6-7 (10-8), 6-2, 7-6 (9-7), 7-6 (7-4) win over 25-year-old Huey. Later, 17-year-old Suk Young Jeong pulled off a 0-6, 1-6, 6-3, 6-0, 6-2 upset of 34-year-old Mamiit.
?This was the first time I experienced it, I felt tight and my hands hurt,? Mamiit recalled.
Pushing the panic button, Mamiit, the team skipper, decided to field himself and Huey for the doubles against Hyun Joon Kim and Jaw Min Seoul the following day.
But that wasn?t easy either as the Filipinos fought hard before hacking out a 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 win that made it 2-1 for the hometown bets.
Mission impossible went on in the reverse singles. Mamiit got a break when Lim retired because of exhaustion, 3-6, 4-6, 6-4, 1-1 (ret).
And with the relegation tie down to its deciding match, Huey mustered all his wits to down Jeong, 7-5, 7-5, 6-3, and cap the come-from-behind win.
The team will host Japan at the Plantation Bay in Lapu-Lapu City in March. Ranked 35th in the world, the Philippines hopes to get back at the Japanese and hopefully make the World Group playoff in 2012. Marc Anthony Reyes
7 Django nails world crown
Francisco “Django” Bustamante finally captured the piece missing in his already-vast trophy collection in 2010: A world title.
On a year when Filipino billiard players continued to sparkle in the international arena, Bustamante carried the fort, ending the year as the World?s No. 1 player.
Proving he?s not yet over the hill, Bustamante triumphed in the World 9-Ball Championship in Doha, Qatar, surviving the tough group stage before drubbing Chinese-Taipei?s Kou Po Cheng, 13-7, in the finals.
But that?s not the only highlight of his rewarding year.
The Tarlac-born billiards star was also enshrined to the Billiards Congress of America Hall of Fame following the footsteps of his close friend Efren ?Bata? Reyes. He also ruled a leg of the World Professional Billiards League in Winnipeg, Canada.
In the Asian Games, Dennis Orcollo and Warren Kiamco had a gold-silver finish in 9-ball singles.
In other events, Lee Van Corteza topped the Predator Sweet 16 Tournament in Manila and Jundel Mazon ruled the 2010 Guinness World Series of Pool 10-Ball Championship in Jakarta. Cedelf P. Tupas
6 Eagles, Lions dominate
It was a season of sweeps and repeats.
Despite treading different paths this year, the Ateneo Blue Eagles and the San Beda Red Lions emerged as the best teams in the country?s premier varsity leagues.
Ateneo had a less stellar cast than its previous championship runs, yet the Blue Eagles still romped to a historic third straight basketball crown in the University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP).
?Definitely this is the most difficult championship we?ve won in the last three years,? said Ateneo coach Norman Black. ?There were doubters and there were critics, but luckily for me my players have big hearts.?
There?s no doubting San Beda, though, in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA).
Favored at all fronts, the Red Lions reclaimed the crown after an 18-0 sweep. San Beda coach Frankie Lim described the entire season as ?excellent,? but the Lions proved to be that and more with a powerhouse lineup led by Sudan Daniel, Garvo Lanete and Borgie Hermida.
?I don?t think there?s any team in this league that works harder,? said Lim after his Lions unseated defending champion San Sebastian Stags.
For Black, the Eagles needed to work doubly hard to stun the title-favorite Far Eastern U Tamaraws in the championship round.
Not one was tagged as the team?s star, yet various players like Kirk Long, Eric Salamat, Ryan Buenafe, Nico Salva, Justin Chua and Emman Monfort stepped up every game.
Both San Beda and Ateneo also forged a double championship in the juniors division while Ateneo added a second straight Philippine Collegiate Champions League title to its collection. Jasmine W. Payo
