Tag: Vol. LXXXV

UST MAY have finished second to De La Salle University anew in the UAAP seniors division overall championship, but its 48 international athlete awardees may well have made up for the disappointing news.

With five titles in men’s and women’s basketball, table tennis, men’s taekwondo and women’s chess, La Salle ruled Season 76 with 289 points, while UST, which had championships in women’s taekwondo and poomsae, finished with 274 points.

UST’s international awardees, who were feted along with other athletes during the UAAP Season 76 closing ceremonies at the Century Park Hotel in Manila last Mar. 19, were the most number of athletes who competed abroad from a single school.

On court, Ennajie Laure, UAAP girls’ volleyball Best Spiker, is the happy-go-lucky type while younger sister and teammate Ejiya, the tourney’s Best Setter, is the fiery one.

But this contrast in demeanor and their similar passion for the game help make them a potent combination for the UST volleyball squad.

Ennajie, or EJ to her friends, admitted that her smile is part of her strategy.

“Although we’re down by huge deficits in games, if my teammates see me smiling, they lose their jitters,” the 16-year-old volleybelle said. “When opponents see me like that, they’re thrown off their focus because they get the impression that they can’t break my spirit.”

Ejiya, or Eya, has always been the fierce one.

JUGGLING sports, academics and other priorities could be exhausting, so athletes let off steam through hobbies and other personal activities.

Siblings Amber and Arvin Plaza of the UST Golden Sox, both music enthusiasts, are members of “Band 202,” a group they formed with teammate Carlo Conge from College of Education and Golden Sox alumni Gerald Dinglasa and Mick Zapanta

The elder Amber, a Communication Arts senior from the Faculty of Arts and Letters, is lead vocalist while Education junior Arvin plays the bass guitar. Conge is drummer while Dinglasa and Zapanta are rhythm and lead guitarist, respectively.

THE UST Salinggawi Dance Troupe (SDT) placed fourth in the NCR Qualifiers of the National Cheerleading Competition (NCC) last Feb. 8 to 9 at the Mall of Asia Arena.

But the group failed to get a podium finish in the National Finals last Mar. 8 to 9 at the same venue.

Garnering 288 points in the qualifying round, SDT placed fourth in the qualifying round which was topped by reigning UAAP Cheerdance Competition champion National University (NU) Cheer Squadron, with 341.5 points. Two-time NCC champion Central Colleges of the Philippines (CCP) finished second with 294 points, while seven-time NCAA cheerleading champion University of Perpetual Help settled for third with 290 points.

SCORING half of his team’s goals, Stephen Iyerio led the Ecclesiastical Faculties (Eccle) football team to a 5-0 demolition of the Arts and Letters Football Club (ABFC) to rule the Thomasian Goodwill Games men’s football tournament at the UST Open Field last Feb. 26.

Iyerio scored two goals at the opening minute and again at the 8th.

Gab Angeles of ABFC came off a midfield scramble and attacked Eccle’s defense, but was easily denied.

Brian Werunga also put himself on the board, feigning to the left before sending the ball the other way to score the third goal for Eccle at the 60th minute.

At the 77th minute, Iyerio stole the ball off a throw-in, dribbled it from beyond the midfield and connected for Eccle’s fourth goal.

THOMASIANS showed off their skills against students of top technological schools across Asia in the Shell Eco Marathon-Asia (SEM) 2014 held at Rizal Park, Manila from Feb. 6 to 9.

UST placed fifth in the gasoline prototype category with its vehicle “Tiger 400-Hybrid” (T400H), and set a record of 172.27 kilometers per liter (km/L), the longest mileage among other Philippine schools that participated this year.

The race was done in five series, where UST set a record of 123 km/L in the first run. But technical errors bogged down the UST team in the second to fourth runs. Its winning record of 172.27 km/L was set in the last run.

UST failed to beat its own record of 198 km/L, set when it first joined SEM in 2010 for the same category.

ALFREDO “Pido” Jarencio steered the UST Growling Tigers to a UAAP championship in his rookie year in 2006, six Final Four appearances and a Philippine Collegiate Champions League title in his eight-year at the helm, and it’s time for him to pass on the torch.

Now appointed as the head coach of Globalport in the Philippine Basketball Association (PBA), Jarencio hopes the next mentor could cherish the alma mater like he did.

“Sa susunod na coach, alagaan lang lang niya ang pangalan ng UST. Mahalin ang eskwelahan at ang community,” Jarencio told the Varsitarian during Globalport’s practice session at the Moro Lorenzo Gym in Ateneo de Manila University.

A NEW ERA is about to begin for the UST Growling Tigers as former chief tactician Pido Jarencio takes a career leap to the pros.

With Jarencio taking the helm of Philippine Basketball Association’s (PBA) Globalport Batang Pier and realizing his life-long dream, Fr. Ermito De Sagon, O.P., Institute of Physical Education and Athletics director, said University officials still have yet to decide who among the “more or less eight applicants” would succeed Jarencio.

Get to know the prospects, their background and what they could bring to the Tigers' bench.

Estong Ballesteros

An assistant coach for the longest time, Ballesteros, who was endorsed by Jarencio, was the early favorite to become the new UST coach.

MEMBERS of the 1996 UST champion team came together and took on the 2006 titlists in an exhibition game in the inaugural Tigers Basketball League at the Buddhacare Gym in Quezon City last Feb. 16.

Almost 20 years since completing the Growling Tigers’ historic “four-peat” UAAP conquest in the 1990s, the 1996 team, led by coach Aric Del Rosario, held off a late rally by the 2006 squad to fashion out a 99-97 victory.

The ’96 cagers didn’t allow age to slow them down as they built a commanding 15-point cushion, 96-81, after former UAAP MVP and current Tigresses head coach Chris Cantojos converted a jumper with less than five minutes remaining.

BOTH UST chess teams capped their UAAP Season 76 tournament at fourth place after separate matches at the De La Salle University Enrique Razon Sports Center last Feb. 23.

After snagging the title from Far Eastern University (FEU) last year, the Male Woodpushers garnered only 33 points this season.

Tied with La Salle, they lost the tie-breaker that gave FEU the championship with 39.5 points. Adamson University came in second with 33.5 points.

The Female Woodpushers made their way to fourth place from sixth in Season 75 behind four-time champion La Salle, UP and FEU.