Friday, November 22, 2019

They are the Champions



The Sablayan team has been enjoying their crown as queens of the Palarong Panlalawigan secondary girls’ basketball for half a decade now. The town hosts the sports festival held November 18 to 22, 2019.

The 2019 batch is led by their main skipper Marigel Ann J. Arbatin, 16, a resident of Barangay Ligaya and wearing jersey number 1. Arbatin, a senior high school student of Sablayan National Comprehensive High School or SABNAHIS taking up Humanities and Social Sciences (HUMSS) Strand is into basketball since 2015 when she and her family moved from Quezon City to their present abode. Originally an elementary sprinter from Olive Grove School, Arbatin looks forward to join the big league in the future like Samantha Harada of National University (NU) Lady Bulldogs who also hails from Ligaya. Marigel, along with Agnes Genata, Kristin Joy Baquirin and Nica Sibugan are regular features in HS women’s basketball scene in Occidental Mindoro.

The team won all of their games, reason why they are declared as the 2019 Provincial Meet champions courtesy of, among other players, Vanessa Tumaca’s lethal running jump shots. Manning, I mean taking, the center position is Novie Jane Reyes, the tallest gal in the line-up who first tried volleyball but seeing her potentials in heft and height, her coach then preferred her to fill the gap in the basketball roster.

Reyes roots for Candace Parker who plays for the Los Angeles Sparks of the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA). Parker was the first overall pick in the 2008 WNBA Draft. This is Reyes’ first time to join the provincial sports meet. Reyes has great potential in the game if led to the right path of the sport.

A total of 8 lady cagers from Sablayan will be in Team Occidental Mindoro in next year’s MIMAROPA-RAA Meet right here in the province. Arbatin, Reyes, Genata, Baquirin and Sibugan will be joined by Patrice Robles, Evelyn De Dios and Elaine Magalong. Other members of the champion lady team are Princess Sulite and J-Zel Heart Sampaga. They are under the tutelage of Coach Ric Casuncad. But in the last 4 years, they were shaped into dribbing and shooting machines by Mr. Monique Benedicto, this year’s head of delegation for the secondary level in the municipality.

I am a Larry Bird fan and allow me to “tweet” this: “A winner is someone who recognizes his God-given talents, works his tail off to develop them into skills, and uses these skills to accomplish his goals,” says Larry. Sablayan again emerged as the meet's over-all champion, back-to-back.

Champions are measured by championships and that is always the name of the game.

Congratulations, young ladies…

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(Photo: Anjhun Manzano)






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