THE ATENEO Blue Eagles ended their day with two losses to the Far Eastern University Tamaraws (FEU) and the Adamson Soaring Falcons (ADU) on Sunday, October 2, 2016 at the SM Sands in Pasay City.
The blue beach spikers are currently 1-3 in the elimination round standings standings of the University Athletics Association of the Philippines (UAAP) Beach Volleyball tournament after Sunday’s two games.
Ateneo’s Marck Espejo and Ish Polvorosa lost in straight sets, 21-18 and 21-17, to FEU in the first game of the day. There were constant holes in the Ateneo defense that the Tamaraws were exploiting throughout the match. Espejo still found ways through the FEU defense but Ateneo’s errors kept piling up and they were unable to regain the lead in the last minutes.
The second match started off much better for the Blue Eagles, the first set ended somewhat comfortably at 21-18. The second set is a very different story altogether, the game tied at 19-19 after a mishit on the attack by Adamson. The match was Ateneo’s for the taking but after five deadlocks and multiple wasted opportunities, the Soaring Falcons forced the third set with 26-24 being the scoreline of an extremely tense and exciting second set.
The last set almost ended early as a loss for the Blue Eagles after Adamson made crucial plays to make bring the game to 9-14, forcing Ateneo into a very dangerous situation. Espejo stepped up and, along with Polvorosa, scored five straight points to bring the game to a 14-14 deuce. Sadly, crucial errors were made by the Katipunan-based squad and the Soaring Falcons prevailed as victors of one of the few three-set games of the day.
“Beach volleyball is a short tournament so no chance to adjust, just execute,” said coach Oliver after the game. Many mistakes were made by both players in the closing minutes of the game and this can be attributed to the amount of time the team had to train on the sand since the entire team is coming off the recent pre-season tournament, Spiker’s Turf.
The team hopes to commit less errors and fix their defensive mistakes for the last three games of the elimination round. The next games will be against the University of the East and the University of the Philippines on Monday, October 3, 2016 at SM Sands in Pasay City.
