Odjie Mamon celebrated his birthday on Tuesday with the University of Santo Tomas Golden Spikers training at their campus.
But the mood was not really celebratory and all during their training session as the long-time UST tactician bared on Wednesday he got mad.
“Yesterday nagalit ako sa training birthday na birthday ko kasi they were lax, they were complacent,” said Mamon.
And it showed in the Golden Spikers’ performance against University of the East, needing to dig deep to escape with a 28-26, 25-16, 20-25, 25-22 win at the SM Mall of Asia Arena.
As usual, it was UST’s errors that held it back from running away with the victory, committing 36 errors.
Although they came up with the win that raised their record to 8-1, rookie Josh Ybañez knows that they could have done better.
However, he also knows that even in whatever way they get the win, Mamon will be happy because as the latter always say “a W is a W”.
“Dumagdag pa, nagalit din siya ngayon kasi matitigas ulo namin,” admitted Ybañez, who dropped 23 points.
“Pero masaya din naman yan si coach kasi napanalo namin yung laro,” he quickly added.
But with five games left in the elimination round, Mamon said there is no room for complacency anymore.
Up next for UST will be the 4-4 De La Salle University on Sunday at the SMART Araneta Coliseum before heading into the Holy Week break.
“Yung preparation namin is hanggang sa dulo, matagal pa naman ang UAAP so okay pa ito ngayon kaya lang hindi na pupwede sa next two games namin,” said Mamon, who also handles the country’s men’s national team and AMC-Cotabato in the Spikers’ Turf.
“They just have to play happily na wala masyadong bagaheng dala kasi kapag masaya sila, alam mo yun.”
