Ruben Inaudito of PAF.
INQUIRER PHOTO/AUGUST DELA CRUZ
Philippine Air Force soared to establish an early lead in Spikers’ Turf Reinforced Conference with a 25-22, 25-18, 20-25, 25-21 victory over Cignal Saturday at San Juan Arena.
Mike Abria gave the Air Spikers the 24-20 match point with a spike down the middle yet it was an error on the HD Spikers side that sealed Air Force’s 2-0 record.
Air Spikers head coach Rhovyl Verayo said they had hard time adjusting especially with middle spiker Alnakran Abdilla going down with a pulled hamstring in the first set.
“I thought to myself ‘ay patay na’ (we’re done for),” Verayo said who also lost another middle spiker, Edwin Tolentino, to right shoulder injury. “We didn’t have one open spiker and another one falls.”
“We had to adjust during the game itself.”
Rodolfo Labrador came through for the Air Spikers with 20 points, 17 coming off spikes, while Reyson Fuentes added 12.
Jeffry Malabanan and Ruben Inaudito, meanwhile, each had 10 points for Air Force.
Cignal, which shocked PLDT in its opener, fell to 1-1.
Lorenzo Capate led the HD Spikers with 13 points while Edward Ybañez and Edmar Bonono added 12 apiece.