The Final Score: Amid Adamson's debacle, remembering young King Falcon Kenneth Duremdes

 

 

A number on the screen mesmerized the audience. 11. Adamson scored 11 points in the first half against National University. It mattered less that NU scored 40 points in two quarters. It mattered more that Adamson could only muster 11 points in twenty basketball minutes. 

 

A number one stood beside another number one beside the name of a team. 11. It should’ve been a typographical error. Like someone was clumsily punching numbers on the keyboard with Cheetos-covered fingers and that someone, upon realizing the gravity of the error, should’ve screamed, “Ay putek! Sorry, sorry. Let me fix that!” 

 

It should’ve been a typo. But it wasn’t. 

 

A song in my head accompanied the televised carnage. Sam Smith’s “Stay With Me” was the unofficial soundtrack of the first three quarters. It just popped in my head in the first quarter (when Adamson scored just three points) and just stayed there, running in place, playing over and over. It was hauntingly appropriate. Like the game pleaded to anyone who was watching, “Please, please, stick around.”

 

Oh won’t you, stay with me?

‘Cause you’re all I need

 

I didn’t have the heart to switch to another channel. My Twitter timeline was also going bonkers as it always does for such events. So I stayed. I know you did too. And you. And you. With eyes wide open and mouths agape, we marveled at the disparity of one team compared to the other. And the numbers on the screen continued to mesmerize. And the song in my head continued to play. 

 

This ain’t love, it’s clear to see

But darling, stay with me

 

Yet the mind could only take so much. Mine needed to drift, to walk away from the anomaly. The cameras caught Adamson coach Kenneth Duremdes standing in front of the Falcons’ bench. His arms were folded. His eyes were looking for answers no one at that instant could provide. He remained still.

 

Deep down, however, he probably wanted to suit up, to slip into the Adamson uniform once more, and score like it was 1993 all over again. At least, that’s what I wanted to believe.

 

“Kenneth was extremely good,” recalled Junie Rentosa, an Ateneo sharpshooter who competed against the King Falcon during the 1993 UAAP season. “He reminded me of Scottie Pippen - long arms, high leaper, but very smooth. Basketball scoring for him was effortless. If he wanted to score on you, he could easily. He was a pure scorer.”

 

As Sam Smith’s voice faded, I saw myself back in 1993, watching a game all the way from the bleachers of the Blue Eagle Gym (I still prefer to call it The Loyola Center), with eyes wide open and mouth agape, as Duremdes ran around defenders like they were little orange cones. 

 

He was really the KD of that year. Not KD as in Kenneth Duremdes. KD as in Kevin Durant. Too tall to defend. Too quick to stop. Too good to contain.

 

“Duremdes was a wingman who was as tall as a center, could sky over opponents like a forward, could shoot from the outside and penetrate like a guard,” shared Sandy Arespacochaga, another former Ateneo Blue Eagle who had the unfortunate task of containing the uncontainable Duremdes. 

 

“His wingspan and athleticism enabled him to get his shot off and shoot over opponents easily. Get too close to him and he will blow by you and dunk it in your face.”

 

I can still see it: Duremdes soaring for a dunk like the game was simply an extension of pregame lay-up lines. He was a digital player against analog defenders, even if we were light years away from NBA2K. He was always in Sega Genesis NBA mode (Sega Genesis! Long live the nineties!) against defenders culled from Nintendo Family Computer’s Double Dribble. The disparity was that wide.

 

“I was still in high school at the time but La Salle invited me to play in the Father Martin tournament and the first game I played was against Adamson,” remembers Dominic Uy, who went on to play for the Green Archers in the UAAP. 

 

“Kenneth was arguably the best college player at that time. He scored 34 against us without really trying.” 

 

It wasn’t so much the 34 points that blew our minds away. I know. 34 points is 34 points. But it was the “without really trying” part that drove us nuts. 

 

We cheered for Ateneo’s Ritchie Ticzon and Vince Hizon because they were our guys. But when Ticzon and Hizon scored their 20-plus points, they fought for every point, scrambled for every field goal, popped several veins, lost pints of blood, gave their all. 

 

When Duremdes scored his 30, on the other hand, he made it look so, so, so simple, he sometimes looked bored. I’m serious. I saw it. I was there. 

 

I was cheering for Ateneo but I was also secretly cheering for Duremdes. I wanted to see him score 60 points using the same effort I needed to open the morning newspaper. 

 

“He was the most dominant individual on another team that I had seen,” said Jason Webb, former Green Archer and now San Mig Coffee assistant coach. “It seemed he was on pace for a triple-double every game on top of what seemed like 40 points. It was the first time I ever played against a guy who was so dominant from the wing position and seemingly had no weaknesses.”

 

As a result, Duremdes redefined what success meant for defenders.

 

“He was scoring from three point shots, driving all the way to the basket and mid-range jumpers,” said Gabby Severino, a former Blue Eagle who is now a long-time assistant coach with Ateneo. “I remember limiting him to 27 points.”

 

“Wala pa si Durant at that time but if he were, people would be comparing them. He was that good,” Arespacochaga added. “And I’m proud to say I played one game against him and helped contain him to his season-high of 38 points.”

 

The ragged sound of another missed jumper suddenly pulled me away from a glorious flashback moment. I was dragged back to reality, back to staring at a number on the screen. 25. Adamson was going to finish the game with 25 points. It wasn’t a typo. There are no orange Cheetos marks on the keyboard. There should’ve been. 

 

People, fairly or unfairly, didn’t praise NU for scoring 62 points. Instead, they wondered how Adamson could only produce 25 points in four quarters. 

 

I sincerely hope it doesn’t happen again. We can only do flashbacks so often. There are, to my knowledge, no Kenneth Duremdes 1993 Adamson YouTube mixtape videos to comfort us the next time around. There are only numbers that can hypnotize. There are only songs that go on repeat in our heads. The next time it happens, Sam Smith won’t suffice. Kulang na yan. We’ll need Karen Carpenter to carry us through.

 

Long ago and oh so far away... 

 

— JST, GMA News