Winning start
Cesca Racraquin and Nieza Viray provided stability for San Beda as it outlasted Jose Rizal, 25-17, 22-25, 25-27, 25-14, 15-6, on Saturday in its triumphant debut in the 95th NCAA women’s volleyball at Filoil Flying V Centre.
Under fire from the Lady Bombers, the Lady Red Spikers found a ballast in the two open spikers, who scored a combined seven points in the fifth set.
JRU, which leaned heavily on team captain Dolly Verzosa, positioned itself for a back-to-back win when it took a two-sets-to-one lead. But the Lady Bombers ran out of ammunition when the match stretched to full distance.
Article continues after this advertisementSan Beda coach Nemesio Gavino was hardly pleased with the victory, saying things looked differently from where he was sitting.
“JRU did a great good. We did not,” he said. “The people may see that we played well because we won but we need to work on many things.”
Racraquin topscored with 23 points, while Viray, the reigning NCAA beach volleyball champ along with twin sister Ella, chipped in 20 for the Lady Red Spikers.
Article continues after this advertisementVerzosa scored 14 points, and Mary May Ruiz added 14 for the Lady Bombers who dropped to 1-1.
Earlier, Perpetual recovered from the sting of an opening-set defeat to also join the winning circle when it downed San Sebastian, 29-31, 25-13, 25-20, 25-20.
The Lady Altas put the disappointment of losing the tight first set to score their first win in two starts, while inflicting on Lady Stags their second successive defeat.
Bianca Tripoli led Perpetual with 17 points while getting ample help from Jhona Rosal and Dana Persa who combined for 23 points.
Meanwhile, Perpetual’s men’s and juniors teams, the league’s reigning champions, also posted victories earlier in the day.
Louie Ramirez scored 17 points to lead the Altas to a 25-18, 25-15, 25-21 win over the Stags for their second consecutive win. The Junior Altas also came through with a 25-19, 25-19, 25-20 win over the Junior Stags.
