THE ATENEO Blue Eagles have emerged as champions of the University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP) Season 78 Men’s Volleyball tournament after defeating the National University (NU) Bulldogs in a three-set sweep (25-16, 25-20, and 25-19) on Wednesday, April 27 at the Mall of Asia Arena.
The Blue Eagles drew first blood and immediately came out strong both offensively and defensively, dominating from the get-go via an eight-point gap early on. The only points managed by the Bulldogs were the result of errors by the Ateneo; by and large however, the Katipunan-based squad used their speed advantage to take the first set without much resistance.
The succeeding set displayed a seesaw battle between the two rival teams. The Blue Eagles remained consistent with their attacks, but overlooked their defensive strategies and committed several errors on their services, giving NU some leverage over them in the earlier parts of the second set. But it was Ysay Marasigan who eventually brought the team its 2-0 advantage, giving the fans an exhibition of powerful attacks that ended the set at 25-20.
The final set saw the Blue Eagles focus on their offensive output, with attackers Espejo and Marasigan going on a streak that nearly finished off the Bulldogs. But just as the team reached its championship point, Gian Glorioso, Lawrence Magadia, and Dan Posadas were substituted in for some of the members of the usual starting six. This led to Head Coach Oliver Almadro’s squad reaching their substitution limit and they were issued a yellow card for delaying the game. But aiming to finally end the game, Espejo made a powerful spike to close Season 78 with a championship at hand.
A season of success
Marasigan capped off his final playing year as this season’s Finals Most Valuable Player (MVP). However, he was not alone in garnering a considerable amount of hardware for the Blue and White.
Espejo dominated the field yet again, taking home the season MVP award for the third time in three years. He also garnered his second Best Spiker award with a spiking efficiency of 51.27% out of 202 spikes, while also nabbing the Best Server award with a total of 23 service aces and an average of 0.46 aces per set. Meanwhile, Ish Polvorosa topped the Best Setter category for the third time with a total of 480 running sets and an average of 9.60 per set.
Many factors played into the success of the Blue Eagles this season.“I guess it’s maturity, experience and discipline, which also allowed me to be a more effective leader,” explained Marasigan, now on his third year as the Blue Eagles’ team captain. “Our biggest motivation was also to give back to the Ateneo community.”
With another successful season for the Blue and White, the Blue Eagles now have even higher expectations for themselves for Season 79.
“Enjoy muna namin yung back-to-back (We are going to enjoy the back-to-back championship first),” Almadro said. “But I can say that I have the materials to make another title run because the program of Ateneo is really good.”
https://storify.com/TheGUIDONSports/blue-eagles-sweep-nu-to-take-men-s-volleyball-cham
