Akari bounced back with a 25-11, 25-23, 25-23 sweep of the winless Galeries Tower to keep its target of a top-three finish in Pool B on track in the PVL Reinforced Conference on Tuesday at FilOil EcoOil Centre in San Juan City.
After absorbing their first defeat at the hands of the Petro Gazz Angels in five sets last week, the Chargers came out firing against the hapless HighRisers, winning by 14 points in the opening set.
However, Galeries put up a gallant stand in the last two sets before Akari eked out its third win in four games to rise to tied second place with Petro Gazz as of posting time.
The Chargers crawled back from a 19-23 deficit in the third, unleashing six unanswered points ignited by Grethcel Soltones’ service to tie the set at 23. Annie Mitchem sent Akari to match point after a big block on Jean Asis before the game-clinching quick attack of Ced Domingo amid the broken play.
‘That’s really our goal, to sweep all our remaining games. But we still have to work on our attitude toward the game and also with each other as teammates,’ said Akari coach Tina Salak in Filipino. ‘It’s been a bit hard to get everyone aligned right now because we’re still adjusting to some changes in our system.’
Salak lauded setter Mars Alba for making the adjustments easier for her teammates after tallying 20 excellent sets on top of four points.
Mitchem topscored with 14 points off 10 kills and four kill blocks. Eli Soyud backstopped the American with 12 points built on eight spikes, three aces, and a block, as Soltones fired four aces for nine points.
‘I’m just really grateful for everyone. especially my coaches and teammates, because we’ve all been putting in the work, especially coming from a loss,’ Alba said. ‘When we got back to training, we really focused on fixing our lapses so that in this game, we could perform better and make the right adjustments.’
Akari wraps up its Pool B stint against ZUS Coffee on November 4 at Mall of Asia Arena.
Galeries finished winless in five games in the first round, facing the top three teams of Pool A in another round starting on Nov.6 at FilOil EcoOil Centre in San Juan City.
Jelena Cvijovic led the HighRisers with 10 points. Asis and Roselle Baliton had nine points each in Julia Coronel’s return, as the Alas Pilipinas setter dished out 14 excellent sets.