The National University (NU) has made sure that the University of Santo Tomas will not go home Sunday night with the same feeling it had during Season 86 of the UAAP Women’s Volleyball Tournament. Bella Belen made that clear before the Lady Bulldogs even set foot on the legendary floor of Smart Araneta Coliseum.
“I told my teammates earlier that ‘(the Tigresses) still don’t have a loss, so it would be nice to win against them,'” Belen said after the Lady Bulldogs handed Santo Tomas its first defeat, 23-25, 25-. 17, 25-21, 25-20, dismantling that ensured no team would sweep this season’s playoff rounds.
Belen showed why she was the first-ever Rookie of the Year and Most Valuable Player with a dominant performance of 24 points on 21 attacks, two blocks and an ace while also doing her part on defense with 13 excellent digs and 10 excellent receptions.
“I saw that my teammates responded well and we all did our best. I’m happy because I saw that what we worked for the last few days showed in this game,” Belen added after NU, who was at the end of the losing game that started Santo’s streak Tomas, poetically was the one who put a stop to this.
Vange Alinsug was also effective and contributed 18 points on 14 attacks, three aces and a block and Alyssa Solomon added 17 points on 12 attacks, three aces and two blocks.
Setter Camilla Lamina had 16 excellent sets to orchestrate the NU offense.
Avoid Pepito
National U avoided giving Santo Tomas defensive ace Bernadett Pepito the service touch and it had consequences for the Tigresses. The Lady Bulldogs found a new target in Angeline Poyos to ensure the Tigresses would be out of sync offensively.
“In practice, we had already achieved the goal we wanted to achieve,” Belen said, visibly emotional after Solomon hit an ace to win the match.
“We didn’t want a repeat of what happened in our match against La Salle in which we had regrets,” she added. “Our mindset was that after this game we should know we gave it our all.”
With most of National U’s trio’s wins going towards Poyos, they reduced the powerhouse rookie’s chances of unleashing her usual damage. Poyos, however, still spearheaded Santo Tomas’ offense with 18 attacks, but was not as effective on defense with only four digs on 23 and 14 on 31 receptions.
This led to an overwhelming 13 service aces for National U, who also had a brick wall at the net with 10 total blocks.
“Almost all of us wanted to win because we wanted to come back from our loss to (the Tigresses),” Solomon said. “Our hard work before this match was worth it because we trained like there was no tomorrow.”
Regina Jurado tried to help the Tigresses, who shot themselves in the foot with 26 huge errors, with 11 attacks. But National, with the exception of a first-set failure, arrived ready to come back from its first-round tormentor and dominated Santo Tomas in virtually every department. INQ