Seeded teams Ateneo and San Beda lived up to their billings, crushing zonal qualifiers Lyceum and San Jose-Recoletos, respectively, at the start of the 2008 Champions League at The Arena in San Juan yesterday.

The Blue Eagles, the UAAP champs, sized up the Pirates in the early goings before stepping up their game on the way to a 77-56 victory.

The Red Lions, the NCAA titlists, buckled down to work early and never let up in clobbering the Jaguars, 98-83.

“It was tougher than before. We’d played them couple of times in the past and it’s always difficult,” said coach Norman Black after his Eagles disposed of the Pirates to advance to the Last Eight against the winner of the Mapua-MLQU match tomorrow in the same venue.

Six-foot-6 Rabeh Al-Hussaini, the 2008 UAAP MVP winner, asserted himself against smaller defenders and piled up 19 points and 18 rebounds with Eric Salamat, Jai Reyes and Nico Salva contributing at least 10 points each.

Guard Joseph Abaya paced the losing team with 16 points that went with five assists and four rebounds.

The Pirates were able to put up a good fight early on, fighting the Eagles through three deadlocks with the last at 37-all in the third quarter.

The Eagles pulled away for good as Al-Hussaini imposed his strength at the paint while Salamat and Reyes came through with clutch baskets in the fourth quarter.

Ryan Buenafe and Jobe Nkemakolam skipped the game due to conflict with their studies. Chris Tiu isn’t playing in the tourney.

“We surprised them (the Jaguars) with our traps. We got a big lead early and held on to it,” said San Beda coach Frankie Lim on their victory.

“We need only four wins to win the championship. We’ve got one and we intend to get three more,” added Lim whose Lions failed to get past the quarterfinals last year.

Sam Ekwe and Borgie Hermida had solid all-round games for the Lions with the former churning out 14 points, nine rebounds, four blocks and one steal and the latter getting away with 13 assists, 10 points and four rebounds.

Off-the-bench player Bam Gamalinda paced the Lions in scoring 18 points in 19 minutes of action.

San Jose-Recoletos starters Luther Justiniani, Manny Gabas, Jabe Delfino, Arman Ponce and John Malinao all finished in double figures in the contest watched by former Jaguars Jojo Lastimosa and Roger Yap.