UAAP: La Salle-Ateneo rivalry continues to be one-sided

La Salle’s Angel Canino during a game against Ateneo in UAAP Season 87 women’s volleyball.–UAAP PHOTO

La Salle made light work of Ateneo on Wednesday, demolishing its archrival for the second straight time in the UAAP Season 87 women’s volleyball tournament.

But Lady Spikers coach Ramil de Jesus knows that the 25-21, 25-17, 25-20 sweep is just a stepping stone towards his squad’s immediate goal.

“We have another goal and that is to get some protection in the semifinals,” De Jesus told the Inquirer after the three-set masterpiece at Smart Araneta Coliseum in Quezon City. “We can get that in the form of a twice-to-beat by locking down on the No. 2 spot.”

La Salle is on track to locking that down after rising to 7-3 to be a win ahead of third-running Far Eastern.

The only team ahead of the Lady Spikers is defending champion National University, which has won all but one of its last 10 outings for the inside track on the first of those two Final Four bonuses.

In the other match, University of Santo Tomas finally got out of the rut, holding off Adamson through five hard-fought sets, 25-18, 23-25, 22-25, 27-25, 15-8.

Powered by Reg Juardo’s fourth-set efforts, the Golden Tigresses held on in the deciding set to end a three-game slide and rise to 6-4.

“Grateful it didn’t get to four,” a relieved Kungfu Reyes said in Filipino during the post-match presser. “The grit of our youngsters [came through for us]. And luckily, in the fourth set, they began recovering.”

“The highs and lows of the game didn’t stop the [players]from keeping at it,” he added. “They overcame all sorts of negative vibes earlier.”

The win gave the Growling Tigresses some kind of buffer inside the magic circle of teams advancing, but still a long way away from gaining a twice-to-beat bonus.

Shaina Nitura gave everything she could for the Lady Falcons, but her 36 points just weren’t enough to will her squad past a traditional powerhouse raring to right the ship.

Confidence-boost

Angge Poyos paced UST with 27 points with 15 receptions and seven digs, backstopping Juardo’s 20 points and 18 digs for a morale-boosting win ahead of a clash against Ateneo slated this Saturday.

“I’m glad because we really needed this win to boost our confidence after losing three. Very grateful, too, that even after being down a couple of sets, we still managed to win,” Jurado said.

With four games left to play in the elimination phase, De Jesus and his charges still have a chance to even wrest the lead from the Lady Bulldogs. But La Salle would have to be perfect from here on and hope that National suffers another stumble along the way.

But the priority, the 12-time UAAP champion mentor said, is ticking off that immediate goal and that is obviously gettin, g No. 2 at the very least.

If anything, La Salle has looked a lot better of late, with its starting setter slowly getting the feel.

The dominant win, led by Mikole Reyes, was a testament to that.

“We’ve been making more time for our setters,” De Jesus, who lost the brilliant Julia Coronel to graduation at the end of the last season, explained. “We want them to gain confidence because you can’t just get smarts and the right frame of mind in one game. You have to put in the time during training.”

Reyes accounted for 19 excellent sets on Wednesday, her playmaking allowing ace Angel Canino to deliver 16 points that was spiked by seven digs as she picked up where she left off after powering through against University of Santo Tomas last weekend, where she played with a neck issue.

AC Miner had 13 points, while skipper Lyann De Guzman chipped in 10 points spiked with 14 receptions as Ateneo slid to 4-6, missing out on a chance to actually extend its three-game winning streak and turn into an actual contender for a Final Four berth.

La Salle has had Ateneo’s number for the last eight years, with the Lady Spikers’ last loss to the Blue Eagles coming in the series opener of the Season 79 championship series.

And presented with such a trivia, De Jesus can only agree that the latest win is only just a bonus at this point in the tournament.

“Yeah. We have other goals,” he said, deadpan.