Lady Eagles eye No. 3 vs Air Force

MANILA, Philippines - Ateneo hopes to nail its third straight win as it takes on winless Air Force today even as San Sebastian tries to recover lost ground against Perpetual Help at resumption of the Shakey’s V-League Open Conference at The Arena in San Juan.

The Lady Eagles fashioned out a pair of straight-set victories over Maynilad and Perpetual to kick off their drive for a second straight championship after toppling the Adamson Lady Falcons in the first conference finals.

They are tipped to annex another one and break off a tie with fancied Army in their 4 p.m. encounter with the Air Force spikers, who, in contrast, are coming off a pair of straight-set losses to San Sebastian and Army.

Fille Cainglet, Ateneo’s leading scorer with a 16-hit norm after two games, will again lead the Loyola-based squad’s bid along with Alyssa Valdez, Angeline Gervacio, Gretchen Ho, Jamenea Ferrer and guest player Aerieal Patnongon.

But with former MVPs Aiza Maizo and Cherry Rose Macatangay expected to have finally settled down with the team’s play patterns, Air Force hopes to rebound from the two setbacks and stay in the hunt for one of the quarterfinal berths in the league sponsored by Shakey’s Pizza.

The Lady Stags, on the other hand, dropped a three-setter to a resurgent Navy side after sweeping Air Force but are slightly favored over the Altas, also winless in two starts, in their 2 p.m. match.

For live streaming of the games, backed by Accel, Mikasa and Maynilad Water, log on to www.v-league.ph. 

Games are also aired on a delayed basis on NBN-4 starting at 2 p.m. and GMA-7’s international channels GMA Pinoy TV, GMA LifeTV and GMA News TV, according to the organizing Sports Vision.

The Altas, reinforced by two Thai players, squandered a two-set lead and dropped a thrilling five-setter to the Maynilad tossers, 21-25, 12-25, 25-16, 26-24, 30-28, in a game that took more than two hours to finish.

Wirawan Sattayanuchit and Piyatida Lasungnern, who combined for 31 hits against Maynilad, hope to further raise the level of their game along with local stars Honey Tubino and Sandra delos Santos as they seek to break into the win column.

But SSC is also raring to bounce back from that loss to Navy on a team built around current leading spiker American Lauren Ford, Joy Benito and Thai reinforcement Jang Baulee.