SOMETHING feels a little different about the University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP) Women’s Volleyball tournament this year. Why so?
Because the De La Salle Lady Spikers are not in the championship round for the first time in, heck, I can’t even remember. But the records say the Girls In Green have had the longest finals appearance streak in recent memory: 10 consecutive UAAP seasons. From Season 71 to Season 80, the Lady Spikers have managed to show up as consistently as the eastern sun in every UAAP women’s volleyball finals. In the league’s Final Four era, no other school has created that kind of an impact.
But wait. Let’s add Ateneo to the picture. Again, records say the Lady Spikers and the Lady Eagles have had the longest running finals match-up in the UAAP for the last 10 years. From Season 74 to Season 79 (that’s 2011-10 to 2016-17), Ateneo and La Salle have disputed the UAAP women’s volleyball crown just between themselves.
With that in mind, we clearly understand why the University of Santo Tomas Lady Tigresses have adopted the battle cry Kami Naman for Season 81. UST, that university with the proud history of athletic achievements in various sports through the years, has not made it to the UAAP women’s volleyball finals for the past eight years.
Now it feels the planets have aligned to make them change their fortunes. Sisi Rondina and her younger back-up can smell it in the air. Destiny is an unstoppable force, and when it starts to move, the chips fall into place like in a scripted play. So even while they lost an important piece in Milena Alessandrini who suffered an ACL mid-season, Sisi and company have forged ahead and played like true tigresses, conquering left and right. They did it the classical way too—one game at a time, which says a lot about their focus. Their big coup was lording it over La Salle in the knockout game for the twice to beat advantage. Their biggest coup was dethroning the erstwhile champs—an immovable force, an unfailing, well-oiled machine—in one fell swoop to make the finals after a long, long time. UST has rocked contemporary UAAP history with that one win that ousted La Salle, and the whole Thomasian community is aroar.
UST is the proud owner of 16 women’s volleyball titles, if I’m not mistaken, through the years. UST last won the women’s volleyball crown in 2009-10 (Season 72). Since then it has not been very lucky. Now that wunderkind, Sisi Rondina has almost singlehandedly brought back her university to the brink of glory. Thanks too to her hungry young tigresses who have joined the hunt with her, a new era has dawned for the Pontifical U. The UST Lady Tigresses have reconquered the women’s volleyball finals and are set to stamp their class all over the league.
But impressive though UST, La Salle and Ateneo have been in UAAP women’s volleyball in recent years, all of them will have to bow to the school that owns the most illustrious record in women’s volleyball since the early days of the UAAP. That would be Far Eastern University.
FEU has 29 UAAP women’s volleyball championship trophies in its trophy room. FEU Womens also has the longest Final Four appearance streak in the league—from Season 56 through 71. It has 22 Final Four appearances total since the UAAP Final Four era began in 1993, two appearances more than La Salle (20), four more than UST (18), and 11 more than Ateneo.
At the time of writing, the FEU Lady Tamaraws are set to do battle with the Ateneo Lady Eagles at the Filoil Flying V Centre for the second finals seat and the right to face the resting Tigresses. This promises to be a good fight, a fierce battle.
Last Saturday at the Mall Of Asia Arena, the Lady Tamaraws stunned the airborne Lady Eagles who held the twice to beat advantage. In typical FEU fashion, the Lady Tams played grounded, steady ball—unfazed by Ateneo’s tumultuous crowd and the early advantage that the Lady Eagles had over them. They just chipped away and bravely held on. FEU fans’ game tees probably said it best: they won’t be just Brave, they’ll be Great. And they were.
In their deciding game on Wednesday, May 8, however, the Lady Eagles will have their game face on, with sharpened talons and eagle eyes focused on the prize. There’s just too much pride and too much history for the Heartstrong Lady Eagles to let go of their rightful claim to the throne. Something that slipped through their fingers last year as FEU moved up to take their place at centerstage.
That’s why this year they’ll be applying the old Ateneo response to the challenge at hand. And they’ll be out to topple the Tamaraws to face the Tigers in the finals.
But just like in the La Salle-UST game last Sunday, the question is whether the old order of a dominant La Salle and/or Ateneo will prevail in the UAAP finals this year. Or will there be a new scenario, a Morayta vs. España setto a.k.a. The U Belt Wars that will capture the imagination of volleyball aficionados?
In men’s volleyball, the FEU Tamaraw Spikers have already successfully banished Ateneo from the men’s finals this season. (FEU Men’s Volley, by the way, has the longest championship streak in the history of the UAAP—from 1946 to 1947.) Will the Lady Tamaraws join their brothers in the finals, too?
Or will we see a Battle Royale between Bea de Leon’s army and Sisi Rondina’s charges on May 11 for Game One of the UAAP Women’s Volleyball Finals.
UST-FEU? Or UST-ADMU.
Congratulations to the winners!