Treat Huey (right) moves out of the way as Cecil Mamiit stretches for a return during their doubles match against GD Jones and Mikal Statham in the Asia-Oceania Zone Group II Davis Cup tourney on Saturday. (Photo by BOB DUNGO JR.)

Cecil Mamiit and Treat Huey outplayed GD Jones and Mikal Statham of New Zealand, 7-6 (4), 6-3, 7-5, on Saturday to give the Philippines its former seat in Group I of the Asia-Oceania Zone Davis Cup competitions.

Bucking the heat and a temporary power outage at the Philippine Columbian Association center court, the Fil-American duo, who replaced original doubles match nominees Johnny Arcilla and Elbert Anasta, huffed and puffed to deliver the goods and give the country an insurmountable 3-0 lead in the best-of-five matches Group II final tie.

Mamiit and Huey had earlier given the Philippines a big 2-0 lead in the opening singles last Friday.

Mamiit, the country’s No. 1 campaigner, overpowered Statham, 6-4, 7-5, 6-2, while Huey saw New Zealand No. 1 Daniel King-Turner retire with the No. 2 local bet leading, 6-4, 6-7 (5), 6-0.

With the outcome already beyond doubt, Filipino non-playing captain Chris Cuarto is expected to field in Arcilla and the newcomer Anasta for the no-bearing reverse singles matches today starting at 10 a.m.

Mamiit and Huey saw the going rough in the first set, where they were forced into a tiebrteak, and the third set where the visitors momentarily led.

In the second set and with the count at 3-3, a 20-minute power outage gave the Filipinos the chance to recharge and when play resumed, they won the next three games for a two-set edge.

In the third set, the Kiwis raced to a 2-1 lead but the Filipinos shrugged this off and held serve all the way from the fourth game before setting up the win with a break of the Kiwis’ serve in the 11th game.

The Filipino pair then blanked the visitors in the next game for the match with Huey scoring on two drop shots and Mamiit closing it out with a service winner and an ace.

After two successive promotions from Group III since 2007, the Philippines lost all of its three ties last year and was relegated to Group II this year.

The Philippines’ best Davis Cup performance came in 1991 when the quartet of Felix Barrientos, Roland So, Danilo Pila, and Camoy Palahang defeated Japan and China in succession to advance to the World Group playoffs where the Filipinos lost to Sweden.

The Filipinos reached this year’s Group II finals by besting Hong Kong in the first round, 4-1, and Pakistan, 3-2, in the second round.

The Kiwis set up the duel with the Filipinos with similar 5-0 wins over Malaysia and Indonesia.