UAAP Women’s Volleyball: FEU and Ateneo seize their moments
by rick olivares
There are moments when the game turns on its head. Where either you seize the opportunity or lose it.
There were two of those this past UAAP Women’s Volleyball weekend.
The first was the FEU-UP game last Saturday that the Lady Tamaraws won in four sets (25-21, 19-25, 25-23, 25-22).
The Lady Tamaraws seized the lead with strong play by Jerilli Malabanan, Heather Guino-o, and Ivana Agudo.
UP played better and took the second set.
The Lady Fighting Maroons started the third set well and had FEU on the back heel with some solid hitting. FEU charged back to tie the score and soon overtook UP. The Lady Tamaraws could have folded right there. But they didn’t.
These are two emotionally fragile squads and it doesn’t take much to upset the cart. And this balances everything, missing players or not. When Isa Molde was sent in late in the first set, I thought that there was this Willis Reed moment. I thought if she scored, she would have blown the roof off the Big Dome. If she scored, that would have been one emotional rescue. But she didn’t and she was subbed out quickly because it was obvious she wasn’t there yet, physically and mentally.
That moment would reprise itself in the fourth frame but it too passed without anything in the favor of UP.
In those crucial moments, it was FEU’s players who not only stepped up to the plate, but belted one out. That’s Czarina Carandang, Guino-o, and Agudo (with loads of help from Ria Duremdes).
How big was that win? It vaults FEU to fourth spot at 7-4 and drops UP to fifth at 6-5.
It was like that as well with the Ateneo-NU match that saw the lady Eagles win their 10thstraight match (26-14, 24-26, 25-17, 25-19). It was similar to the FEU-UP match where Ateneo overpowered NU in the first, buckled in the second, looked shaky in the early part of the third but found their verve in the middle of the set that propelled them to a four-set win.
When NU looked like they would turn the tables on the Lady Eagles, they got back in the game with defense. That five players scored in double figures (Jules Samonte and Kat Tolentino each scored 13, Maddie Madayag had12, and Bea De Leon and Ponggay Gaston added 10) shows that the team is humming and in step heading into this long-awaited return bout with La Salle.
I liked how players like Jaycel delos Reyes, Jaja Maraguinot, Erika Raagas, and Vannie Gandler stepped in and gave quality minutes. Even if some didn’t score, it helps that they contributed in some way. That should bolster their confidence for the long haul.
That the Lady Eagles are being tested throughout this 10-game win streak will only mean well for them come the playoffs as they chalked up that twice-to-beat advantage that comes with their league-best 10-1 record with three matches to play.
To paraphrase the old saying, “what doesn’t break you makes you stronger.”
That will be tested to the hilt when they play DLSU.
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