The UPH Eagles Basketball Team won the general champion of the Regional Student Sports Week (Pomda) VII Banten 2018, November 26th-30th, 2018. This success also became a recognition that the UPH team was the best university of 41 Universities in Banten in the field of sports. With no half-hearted, the UPH Eagles team, under the auspices of the UPH Sports Department, brought 25 medals; namely, 23 gold medals, 1 silver medal, and 1 bronze medal.

UPH excelled from Universitas Sultan Ageng Tirtayasa (Untirta) which was in second place with 17 gold medals and Sekolah Tinggi Keguruan dan Ilmu Pendidikan (STKIP) in third place with 13 gold medals.

For this achievement, Stephen Metcalfe, the director of UPH Sports as well as coach of Team Eagles, shared his experience in preparing UPH Student-Athlete.

“In the match at Pomda VII Banten 2018, we didn?t bring 4 of the best players from UPH. We brought players who hadn’t played too often before. We did that to increase the experience of our players,” Metcalfe said.

Pomda VII Banten this time competed for 14 sports branches, including futsal, badminton, swimming, volleyball, chess, athletics, and others. This activity has been attended by approximately 1,800 student-athletes from several universities in Banten. This sports week aims to attract the best Banten student-athletes. Moreover, for The Regional Secretary (Acting) of the Banten Provincial Government, Ino S. Rawita, this activity was held for creating an organized, measurable, and systematic sports activity by which achievements are gained.
Yayan S. Ryan, Secretary 1 of Bapomi Banten, added that the achievements of the Banten athletes will, hopefully, continue to increase, especially at the 2019 National Sports Committee.

To support this achievement, according to Ryan, it needs to be supported by equipping in terms of character building for athletes.
In line with this, Stephen Metcalfe also has been always stressed that in their achievements, UPH?s student-athletes must have a good attitude.

“Playing in a competition is not just for a trophy, but more than that; for God, family, others, and ourselves. Winning or losing, our players must be able to develop. This is the focus for UPH Sports and our basic value; that is, we must give the best in sport-field, orienting at the process, and having a perspective on eternity.?

Not only this achievement, but the UPH Eagles team was also selected as a delegation of Athletes from Indonesia to play in the International championship.

“UPH can represent Banten to compete in the international championship in representing Indonesia later. It?s something to be proud of for Banten because athletes, from a university in Banten, are able to play in international matches,” said Deden Apriandhi, the head of the Department of Youth and Sports (Dispora).

This was also acknowledged by Cesar Wilhelem Harry Christian – Section Head of UPH Sports Department; that currently, the UPH Eagles team is preparing to compete in the Asean University Games in Myanmar, December 8th ? 19th, 2018. Surely the UPH Eagles Team hopes to bring the best results.

Previously in 2018, the UPH Men’s Basketball Team also gained achievements to UPH as the first Champion of the 2018 National Student League and as the 2018 LIMA Runner-Up for the women’s basketball team in last August. (mt)