Ramil de Jesus. Photo by Tristan Tamayo/INQUIRER.net
MANILA, Philippines—De La Salle’s unbeaten run came to an end when it suffered an upset loss to University of the Philippines in five sets, 21-25, 25-20, 25-21, 20-25, 15-12, Saturday at Smart Araneta Coliseum.
Lady Spikers head coach Ramil De Jesus said the setback wasn’t much attributed to their opponents’ superior skills but to the Lady Maroons’ better team chemistry.
“It came to a point that our opponents showed their cohesiveness on the floor because there are times when we’ll receive easy balls but it would end up being a point for UP because we lacked communication on the floor,” said De Jesus in Filipino.
The loss meant the Lady Spikers now have to share the top spot with the Lady Maroons with identical 3-1 records.
De Jesus added that his team also failed take advantage of opportunities.
“We were in good situations but we couldn’t capitalize, and we have to fix that,” said De Jesus. “This was also the first time this season that my players encountered an opponent that wanted to badly beat us. That was one of factors, UP wanted the win more than us.”
Still, it’s only one loss just four games into the season and De Jesus wants his team to put the defeat behind and bounce back immediately.
“I told them that they have to bounce back and it’s important that we won’t let any team beat us again,” said De Jesus. “Our first goal is to bounce back, we shouldn’t think about the championship at this point and instead we should find a way to recover from this.”