Ateneo Women's Volleyball: The Trying Times

The Trying Times
Ateneo Women’s Volleyball at the End of the First Round of Season 71
words and pictures by rick olivares

The Ateneo Women’s Volleyball Team is young yet some mistake them to be some parts old. It is a misnomer because of the holdovers from last year’s squad, only a couple saw quite some playing time. So in reality it is really a young team. One laden with potential in spite of a glaring lack of ceiling to battle the statuesque frontlines of opposing teams.

The Lady Spikers have shown that they can hang with the best of them when they extended Adamson and FEU to five sets where they fell because of a lack of experience. At the same time they’ve surrendered sets to UE and NU when they should have plastered them with brutal finality and utmost urgency. And when they lost badly to DLSU and UST maybe they were expected to put up more of a fight than getting swept in one, two, and three.

They’re like a diesel engine that starts slowly but once they get going well, they get going. Only at times, other squads have racked up a sizeable lead that’s a little difficult to overhaul.

Former football great Marcel Desailly once said that an athlete’s performance is 50% skills and talent and 50% confidence. It’s all true as the latter – confidence – is borne out of playing time and that begets consistency and toughness. After all, how do you know how to react to situations when you’re hardly on the court to effect what is taught in practice?

Wins make people overlook certain details but loses magnify even the most minute and nothing is left sacred or deemed trivial.

There’s an upside to this because the losses sting which means people care. The new-found attention that volleyball has received can only mean good for the sport in general and for the Ateneo team because that means better training and support will be made available.

And you have to like the fact that they so want to win. They have a captain who cares and values the team and who strives to set an example. They have a squad that has come together after a semi-tumultuous pre-season where they planned their own team building session and have instituted amongst themselves ways to improve chemistry and bonding.

It’s not a perfect picture yet even so they’re still good enough to compete for a Final Four spot. They know they have to beat one of the upper tier teams if they want to make it to the post-season.

The losses have been tough and serve as a jarring reminder of the work and sacrifice that needs to be done. Here is where they see what they are made of and how good they can be. It’s gut check time where they cannot afford a few more mistakes or slippage.

They will put in their time and only need support. Do you jump on the bandwagon because volleyball is in vogue and there’s a sexist reason to watch a pretty face?

The Lady Spikers have endured their forever version of the Dark Ages and even went through a revolving door of coaches in the last couple of years.

They’re out there competing to an audience of mom and pop, three cheerleaders, members of the men’s volleyball team, and the odd fan or two like me who has made it his personal mission to help these teams in the past couple of years.

Yes, these are trying times fraught with an uphill climb and tough foes but remember how a wise man once said that isn’t the journey everything. And that sometimes is what we can ever ask from another.