After a sluggish start, the Jose Rizal University Lady Bombers upended the feisty Mapua Institute of Technology Lady Cardinals in five sets, 25-21, 19-25, 25-18, 23-25, 15-8, Monday afternoon at the FilOil Flying V Centre in San Juan City.
Team captain Shola Alvarez and Rosalie Pepito led the charge for the Mandaluyong-based spikers with a combined 32 points. Alvarez scored 17 markers, 12 coming from attacks and four coming from aces, to go along with 22 digs.
In the sets that they won, JRU leaned on their faster transition to rack up the points. Mapua, for their part, turned to their blocking to keep themselves in the game. Angelica Guardian and Precious Sedenio patrolled the net with a total of nine blocks of the team’s 10.
Alvarez shared that the team just listened to head coach Mia Tioseco in order to overcome the Lady Cards’ net defense.
“Coach, ano yung pwede kong gawin para makalusot sa blocking nila? Una raw po, itaas ko po kamay ko,” Alvarez said. “Mga first step para makalusot. Nung nakinig po ako kay coach, nag-effect naman po.”
In the fifth set, JRU just took advantage of a gassed out Mapua crew. With the reigning Best Server Alvarez on the service area, the Lady Bombers pushed themselves to the inevitable win.
Jela Pena paced the Lady Cardinals with 20 points, 18 coming from attacks to put her team ahead on the scoring skills over the Lady Bombers.
However, it was the horrendous number of errors from the Intramuros ladies, 52 to be exact, that made it extremely hard for them to take the victor
The Scores:
JRU (3) – Alvarez 17, Pepito 15, Montojo 12, Bondoc 5, Sixto 4, Rivera 2, Macaraya (L)
MIT (2) – Pena 20, Sedenio 16, Ramilo 10, Manungdayao 6, Guardian 6, Aquino 3, Racelis 2, Luzon (L)
