How the Lady Falcons escaped defeat in Game 1 of three-game title series vs UP
By Eddie Alinea
PhilBoxing.com
Wed, 15 Mar 2023
The first thing to establish about Ana Santiago is that there really is one.
She currently is the winningest softball coach in the UAAP with 14 title conquests while calling the shots from the Adamson University Lady Falcons’ bench. She has a chance of raising that record to 15 in this Season 85 of the varsity league.
Last Tuesday Game 1 of the Lady Falcons’ best-of-three gold medal series against the University of the Philippines Lady Maroons, coach Ana, once again, showed why she has earned that many honors by making a series of moves that spelled the Lady Falcons’ triumph. The score was 1-all going into the lower half of the seventh and final inning and the Soaring Falcons in the offensive end.
Starting and winning pitcher Glory Alonzo, one of at least half-a-dozen members of the Philippine Blu Girls in Santiago’s roster, had just successfully shutout the Lady Maroons in their last two chances to grab the upper hand in the upper sixth and seventh.
It was, therefore, defend on coach Ana’s next moves whether to win the game outright and gain big psychological edge of keeping the crown they captured three seasons ago before softball was removed from the UAAP calendar due to Covid 19 pandemic.
Or keep the tie and send the showdown into extra periods like what happened in their first encounter in the elimination round won by UP following four-inning overtime played in nearly five hours.
“No, I don’t want my girls go to that agonizing moment again,” coach Ana must’ve thought. And the quick thinking mentor immediately reconstructed her starting lineup by removing Alicia Pichon, a regular feature in her dreaded batting order but hardly a factor in her offensive rotation that time, and inserted centerfielder Alaiza Talisik to do the job of at least making it on base for a designed last move to score a run and emerge triumphant.
The move confused the Lady Maroons’ losing hurler Kacelyn Valino, who in her desire to avoid making an easy pitch for Talisik to connect, rolled her pitch to the ground instead, hitting one of the batter’s legs. With one on in first, Santiago fielded Madelaene Domaug as substitute runner for Talisik.
Dumaug tried to steal second right after stepping on base forcing the UP backstopper to throw wild bringing pinch hitter Mae Langga up.
Langga swang Valino’s fastball in her turn at bat, sending the leather to center and Dumaug home for the tie-breaking run and coach Ana and her Lady Falcons jumping in celebration of a hard-earned victory on the way to earning what could be their 19th championship, two short of Far Eastern University record 21.
No less than UP’s representative to the UAAP board of management, Kiko Diaz, expressed praises for coach Ana’s coaching ability saying after the Lady Maroons loss and his appreciation to what the Adamson bench tactician had done to win.
“Well, hanga ako sa ginawa ni coach Ana para manalo kanina. She really has lifted the Lady Falcons to that win. Magagaling naman talaga sila. What with a lineup with a nearly a dozen members of our Blu Girls.”
“But this doesn’t mean that we’ve already lost. No. Laban pa rin kami,” Diaz said in a post-game statement shared by UP head coach Ronilon Pagkaliwagan.
“Sa tutoo lang, wala namang brilliancy sa ginawa namin. Lahat ng sport may mga privilege na ibinibigay para manalo ang teams,” Coach Ana humbly said. “We only have to avail of them at the right time and circumstances. Na-tsambahan lang namin.”
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Eddie Alinea.
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