University of Santo Tomas enter the UAAP finals
The first match of the Final Four in the 73rd University Athletic Association of the Philippines women’s volleyball tournament took place this Wednesday. The venue of the event was the Arena in the city of San Juan. In a highly interesting match that went on till four sets, the University of Santo Tomas, who has the title of the defending champions to its credit, emerged as victors. By defeating the Adamson team, they have now made it to the finals. At the end of the match, the score board showed final set scores of 25-23, 25-18, 17-25, 25-21 in favour of UST.
The UST players were performing at their best with four of them being able to post scores in double digit figures. Top of the list was Aiza Maizo, who contributed 20 points in the overall match that went on for 94 minutes. Maizo was helped by her team mates Maru Banaticla, a sophomore and Maika Oritz. Both Banaticla and Oritz were able to register 12 points each for UST. Judy Caballejo kept the score board ticking by adding 10 points of her own.
The player who was able to make any significant contribution towards the scores of the Lady Falcons was Angelo Benting. Benting added 13 points to the score board but was not helped reasonably by any of her team mates. Thus, the Lady Falcons did not make it to the UAAP finals for the third time in a row.
Cesael Delos Santos, the coach for UST commented on his team performance in the following words: “We need to play with a higher intensity in the finals…They relaxed a bit in the game. They played better in the first two sets but were inconsistent."
The first set of the match was highly competitive. No one was sure where the tables would turn as both the sides were neck to neck during the entire game. However, UST eventually managed to pull forwards and were able to win the starting set by 25-23.
The second set was relatively easy to win for UST as Adamson did not put up a well coordinated effort to take control of the game. Therefore, UST made a comfortable win by making the score board show 25-18 at the end of the set.
With the loss of two sets, the pressure mounted on Adamson and they rallied themselves together to put in a commendable effort. The Adamson team was relentless in the third set and they did not let UST dominate the game at any point. The win was made at 25-17.
The fourth set of the match got tense as both the teams were putting in their best efforts. However, UST sealed the deal by ending the last set of the match by 25-21.
UST is now set to play either La Salle or Ateneo in the final on Saturday.
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