Petro Gazz Angels’ Brooke Van Sickle.–MARLO CUETO/INQUIRER.net
Despite displaying a strong performance in a preseason tournament, Brooke van Sickle still felt the nerves in her first game in the Premier Volleyball League (PVL).
“I felt like we’re a little tense, not really flowing as well. Probably first game jitters a little bit,” said the Filipino-American hitter after only contributing seven points in Petro Gazz’s otherwise dominating 25-12, 25-20, 25-12 victory against league newcomer Strong Group Athletics (SGA) at PhilSports Arena on Tuesday.
“It’s still really good to start PVL with a win. [The] other team did really well, they blocked very well and they’re really scrappy so it was a good win,” she added.
READ: Brooke Van Sickle admits to first game jitters in PVL debut
Chery Tiggo also welcomed Capital1 the harsh way, scoring a 25-6, 25-15, 25-15 victory in the second game.
Ara Galang scored 12 points and Mylene Paat 11 for the Crossovers. Van Sickle led Petro Gazz to the Philippine National Volleyball Federation Champions League title and was hailed as the tournament’s Most Valuable Player, but she had an uncharacteristic outing in her PVL debut.
And she still has a lot of time to address that, but she would have to move with urgency as well, as Petro Gazz faces a formidable threat in its next game with last conference’s silver medalist Choco Mucho.
READ: Brooke Van Sickle feels at home with Petro Gazz, shines in debut
“There’s always gonna be butterflies. It’s the start of the conference,” Van Sickle said. “I can only thank my teammates because they made it easy to adjust. I’m very thankful.
“We’re gonna expect a really good fight (against the Flying Titans). We just have to go into this week just working extremely hard and continue to push to build that team chemistry.
Even the Angels’ new Japanese mentor Koji Tsuzurabara saw that his wards are playing the exact opposite of their performance in the preseason stint.
Finding chemistry
“First game in the PVL so everyone, all the players are nervous,” Tsuzurabara said after also winning his league debut. “[The Angels’] movement aren’t that good so there are a lot of mistakes so today is so-so.”
Despite not suiting up hitters Jonah Sabete and KC Galdones, Petro Gazz still handily defeated SGA behind Nicole Tiamzon, who helped the Angels with 15 points built around 13 attacks and two aces.
READ: Brooke Van Sickle puts PVL on notice with impressive Petro Gazz debut
“We’re trying to find our chemistry also, it’s our first game so there are still a lot of lapses, a lot of errors,” Tiamzon said as the Angels committed six more errors than SGA. “Tomorrow we’re going back to training and we’ll fix everything.”
“We made a lot of errors tonight and hopefully, more training will help decrease that moving forward. Hopefully, we’ll do better,” Van Sickle said. INQ