THE BLUE and Lady Paddlers succumbed to fierce competition as they settled for sixth and fifth place, respectively in Season 71 of the University Athletics Association of the Philippines Table Tennis Competition last September 20, 21, 27, and 28 at the Blue Eagle Gym.

The games saw University of Santo Tomas (UST), Far Eastern University (FEU), and University of the Philippines (UP) dominate over the opposition, with UST and FEU taking the championship in the Men’s and Women’s Division respectively, and UP finishing in third place for both divisions.

Better, but needs experience

Despite missing a podium finish, the Paddlers remained optimistic and emphasized the need for improvement and taking this season as a rebuilding phase, in preparation for future competition.

Lady Paddlers Team Captain Claire Yu (IV BS CoE) said that the performance of the women’s team in this year’s competition was better than last year. “[It’s just that] other schools also improved a lot from previous years, plus the fact that all of them are already veterans.”

She pointed out that the main weakness of the team is its lack of experience, since majority of the players enter the varsity as beginners and are limited to less than a year to train for the UAAP season.

Blue Paddlers Team Captain Percival Elfan (IV BS Mgt) echoed the same sentiments. “I didn’t expect that the lack of experience would be such a big factor. But this year we have five rookies so we [had] problems with experience.”

The Paddlers from UST took home the lion’s share of the awards. In the Men’s Division, Glen Rodriguez bagged the Most Valuable Player award while Zoren Mendiola won Rookie of the Year. At the Women’s Division, Kheithlynn Cruz represented the España-based squad as their MVP while University of the East’s Donna Gamilla took home the Rookie of the Year award.