It will be the searing heat of summer which will usher in the Philippine Basketball League’s Challenge Cup this March 25. And the Magnolia Dairy Ice Cream Wizards, fresh from winning the PBL’s Heroes Cup, promise to be as intense and as purposive.

“Our goal is to win a back-to-back championship,” bespectacled Wizards’ coach Koy Banal said after beating the Rain or Shine quintet 75-60 in Game 5 of their best-of-five championship series last February 16. The prospect for a repeat looks very bright indeed. For one, Banal’s wards have shown the stuff that true champions are made of, mirroring the passion for success and teamwork of the organization that the Wizards represent in the PBL. In winning the recent Heroes Cup, the young team also showed a maturity honed for three years since San Miguel rejoined the PBL in 2003 with the UAAP titlist FEU Tamaraws at the core of its players’ roster.

Reminiscent of the mid-1980s when the Magnolia ball club was a force to be reckoned with in amateur basketball, the Wizards has pulled off one of the most stunning comebacks in the PBL’s 23-year history. Staring at a humiliating sweep in the best-of-five battle against a seasoned Rain or Shine squad, Magnolia did not blink and clawed out of its 0-2 debacle to win all of the series’ last three games to annex the Heroes Cup trophy to the Unity Cup title won in 2004 by the then San Miguel PBL entry Viva! Mineral Water Force.

“It was during that hard climb to be able to level the series that we were able to know each other very well. Our doubts with each other were removed, and we trusted each other more from that day on,” said Banal. Credit, he concludes, goes to the entire Magnolia team and not on individual heroes. “If you’re going to ask me about heroes, there are a bunch of them: from management, the players to the coaching staff and to our utility men,” he added.

And the good news is that the Wizards’ team of heroes remains intact in the PBL Challenge Cup. All raring to go for another title shot are Heroes Cup finals MVP Kelly Williams, former league MVP Arwind Santos, Mark Isip, RJ Rizada, Jeff Chan, Kim Valenzuela, Gerard Jones, Jayson Misolas, Jeff Bombeo, Alex Angeles, Wynsjohn Te, RB Mangahas, Francis Barcellano, JR dela Cruz, and veteran Joel Co. Williams, a native of Detroit whose mother hails from Danao, Cebu, said the title meant more than any of those he won back in the US. For Co, it was his second championship. His first came two years ago playing for champion VIVA! in the Unity Cup, a title that has turned out as only the first of more to come for San Miguel’s PBL franchise.