Monday, March 24, 2008 SWU takes Malapascua beach volleyball title
THE Cebu Volleyball Association (Ceva) made its first baby steps in its bid to snag an event in the 2014 Asian Beach games after staging a beach volleyball tournament in Malpascua.
Ceva is hoping to snag a hosting job in the 2014 Asian Beach games and is already starting to showcase some of Cebu’s impressive beaches.
Malapascua Island hosted its first beach volleyball competition and got positive responses from some of Cebu’s toughest beach volleyball squads following the success of last weekend’s Mayor Sun J. Shimura Beach Volleyball Open.
Southwestern University’s Florianne Gutierrez and Janelle Tabio took the crown.
“If we want a simulation of the Boracay beaches in preparation for the Nestea Beach Volleyball Competition, then Malapascua is the right place to train,” said SWU head coach Janeth Ponte, who is gearing her wards for another national title in the country’s premier beach volleyball competition.
“The sands are exactly like that in Boracay. I am planning to bring them back here especially if we qualify for the Boracay leg so that we could practice,” Ponte said.
Gutierrez and Tabio trounced former teammate Maritess Natad and new partner Christine Bohol—the Volleygals, 25-22, for the title.
Ironically, Gutierrez and Natad were partners when SWU claimed the Nestea national titles in 2004 and 2005. Natad, who has already graduated, and Tabio were together last year in taking the runnerup diadem in the Nestea event.
Now going up against each other, knowing both strengths and weaknesses of the other, yesterday’s final match was thrilling to the players and spectators made up of locals and tourists alike.
“Ian (Gutierrez) is just starting to get her old moves back and she had to struggle for some time during the game before she could find her groove,” said Ponte, who was Gutierrez’s partner in claiming the 2003 Nestea title.
SWU was comfortably leading, 19-14, when the Volleygals retaliated with a crushing 4-0 rally to slice the lead, 18-19.
Natad knew that Gutierrez has a bum knee, causing her to slow down, and Natad volleyed in strong shots, which worked fine against Gutierrez’s slow defense.
The Volleygals’ recovery was mostly due to some unforced errors caused by Gutierrez, whose spikes were too strong and almost always miss the line.
Gutierrez made up for her errors by playing smarter. Since power went against her team, she then started tapping the ball in vacant spaces to eventually recover and take the victory.
In the other game, M2Ms Mechelle Matuguina and Marissa Lagancia took third place after trouncing the Joy Bonita and Kenett Garces, 25-12.
The winning team pocketed P5,000, while the runners up got P3,000 and P2,000 respectively.
The competition was a joint project of Government of Daan Bantayan, Ceva and the Governor’s Cup. (MCB)
