CEBU CITY — University of the Visayas’ Leonard Santillan captured his second straight slam dunk contest crown on Sunday in the 15th Cesafi All Star Festivities at the Cebu Coliseum.
Santillan, who once played for the Batang Gilas, leapt over three people including his teammate Jun Manzo, and slammed home a tomahawk dunk that earned him a perfect score of 50 for his second dunk and finish with a total of 85 in the finals.
He beat the University of Cebu’s JR Puerto and University of San Carlos’ Dolan Adlawan in the final round of the competition that earned much hype with the presence of several explosive dunkers led by University of San Jose-Recoletos’ Miguel Gastador and UV’s Rey Suerte, but by and large, disappointed fans and players alike with an odd contest format.
The participants were given just one attempt in the elimination round, with the top three advancing to the finals. This left little room for creativity as Gastador and Suerte, who tried dunks with high degrees of difficulty, failed to convert on their single attempt and were promptly eliminated.
In the three-point shootout, another Green Lancer won as Franz Arong outgunned USJ-R’s RJ Dinolan in a winner-take-all shootout, 15-8. Arong and Dinolan remained tied after the final round as they both scored 13.
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