In their last game in the second round of the AVC Women's Senior Volleyball Championship, the hosts Philippines just beat one of the Southeast Asian greats Vietnam in a 4 set thriller at the Alonte Sports Arena in Binan, Laguna.
The Philippines has to come from behind to win the first two sets, 27-25 and 26-24. The third set was handily won by Vietnam, building a commanding lead early in the set, which ended at 17-25. The fourth set was not even a close one. The Philippines lead almost the whole set, building as much as a 6 point lead. In the end, a combination play for Alyssa Valdez ended the match. Here is the match point of Valdez as posted in the ABS-CBN Sports Twitter page:
Valdez top scored the Philippines with 20 points and Jaja Santiago added 19 markers. It is also good to note that we also had superb floor defense from Dawn Macandili and blocks from Aby Marano.
If this is a good gauge for the upcoming Southeast Asian Games, we really have a good chance in getting a podium finish this year after 12 years since we last won the bronze from the regional meet when we last hosted the games in 2005.
The Philippines will next meet another Southeast Asian volleyball giant Thailand in the quarterfinals tomorrow night.
Filipino sports fans was in for a treat tonight - with not one, not two but three great wins tonight from 3 different Philippine teams in 3 different sports.
The first win was scored by the Philippine National Women's Volleyball team when they sweep their first group match versus Hong Kong in the AVC Senior Women's Volleyball Championship at the Alonte Sports Arena in Binan, Laguna. The Filipinas had a tentative start but never looked back once they got the momentum. They beat the HK ladies via a 25-21, 25-16, 25-17 tally.
The team was led by Alyssa Valdez with 14 points and Jaja Santiago with 13 points. The next assignment of the girls will be Kazakhstan on Friday.
The next win was from Gilas Pilipinas who also opened their campaign in the 2017 FIBA Asia Cup in Beirut, Lebanon. In their first group stage match, they were able to get an upset win over defending champion China, 96-87.
The Philippines 🇵🇠fight off a big comeback from China 🇨🇳 to open their #FIBAAsiaCup2017 campaign
Gilas led most of the game, with China almost pulling off their come from behind surge in the fourth quarter, even getting the lead in the last quarter. But Gilas was able to hold on and was able to clinch the win. Terrence Romeo topscorred with 26 points, Japeth Aguilar has 5 blocked shots and Gabe Norwood coming up with 3 steals and 3 blocks. Here are the highlights of the game from FIBA's official YouTube channel:
Next game will be against WABA dark horse Iraq on Friday night.
To cap off this streak, PFL's Ceres Negros FC was declared as the ASEAN Zone Champion at the 2017 AFC Cup in front of their home crowd in Bacolod City. Ceres Negros won over Home United FC at Bacolod with a score of 2-0 and a 3-2 win on aggregate. OJ Porteria started with an early goal at 2' time. The second goal was from a penalty kick from Manny Ott.
Petron volleybelle Ces Molina and F2 Logistics and former Green Archer middle blocker Mika Reyes received the last 2 golden tickets and completes the line up of 7 local Pilipinas Super Liga players that will be included in the Philippine Team in the upcoming 2016 FIVB Volleyball Women's Club World Championship.
Molina was a surprise addition to the team as her name was not as commomnly included in some of the sportswriters and fans wish list. This spiker from Nueva Ecija and a former San Beda Red Lion from NCAA is a reliable attacker of Petron. She will definitely contribute to the team in this aspect but we still need to see how her skills measure up with much taller blockers that are playing in the tournament. She is also part of the Petron team that competed in the Asian Club championship earlier this year. Her inclusion to the team was announced last July 24.
The last golden ticket recipient was announced last July 28 when the league was in Batangas. The includion of Reyes, who is a reliable middle blocker and has been a consistent block points provider to her team, is no surprise to many. She was also named as the league's ambassador, replacing her F2 Logistics teammate Cha Cruz.
The local players are now complete - Rachel Ann Daquiz, Jovelyn Gonzaga, Kim Fajardo, Jen Reyes, Jaja Santiago, Molina and Reyes. They will be joined by 7 other imports who are still to be named.
The tournament will be held here in the Philippines on October 18 to 23, 2016 at the Mall of Asia Arena.
National University stand out Jaja Santiago has earned the 5th golden ticket to participate and represent the Philippines in the 2016 FIVB Volleyball Women's Club World Championship to be held here in Manila.
This was announced during the press conference introducing the team of Foton Philippines that will participate in the AVC Asian Women's Club Championship in Laguna on September.
Santiago is currently playing under Foton club team in Pilipinas Super Liga and is still playing for National University in the UAAP. She is a reliable middle blocker but has been seen training and playing as a spiker in the past few games. She previously turned down the offer of UCLA and choose to play her collegiate games locally with NU.
It is also rumored that several scouts are in town to watch Jaja in her games and possibly invite her to their foreign clubs. Jaja has also represented the Philippines in the 2014 Asian U23 Championship in Manila and the 2015 Southeast Asian Games in Singapore.
She now joins Rachel Ann Daquiz, Jovelyn Gonzaga, Kim Fajardo and Jen Reyes in the PSL All Star Team. We are just waiting for 2 more names of local players whch will play together with 7 imports during the FIVB tournament.
