The UE Red Warriors won over the UST Growling Tigers on the elimination round finale to secure the #2 seed against Ateneo in the semifinals.

The two teams were locked 43–all when Wesley Gonzales, Rich Alvarez, Larry Fonacier and Andrew Cruz engineered a 21–3 run to put Ateneo up 64–46 with eight minutes left in the fourth quarter.

[3] The deciding game would also go down to the wire; Gec Chia turned over the ball to UE, where James Yap converted at the other end to put the Red Warriors up, 70–68.

Yap missed a three-pointer on the ensuing possession, Jay-arr Estrada grabbed the rebound but Paul Artadi committed a turnover.

With Ateneo now having the possession with 7.8 seconds remaining, LA Tenorio dribbled the entire length of the court to find his path blocked by two UE players.

Late in the game, LA Tenorio missed both free-throws, but drew an offensive foul from Mike Cortez to give Ateneo the possession with 39.3 seconds left.

Rich Alvarez missed consecutive shots, but Enrico Villanueva split his free-throws to put Ateneo up by two points with 9.2 seconds remaining.

Sonny Tadeo and Epok Quimpo scored on a 5-point run to add Ateneo's lead to eleven points with barely over two minutes left.

Santa Maria and BJ Manalo scored a 4–0 run, but Fonacier scored on the free-throw line off a Cortez to foul to win the championship for Ateneo, their first since their consecutive title run from 1987 to 1988, and denying La Salle to set a new record of a 5th-consecutive men's title in the Final Four era, a feat later achieved by Ateneo 10 years later.