The Cesafi volleyball tournament is down to its last five game days and the race for the coveted title gets more interesting and unpredictable as the season draws to a close.
Today, the round-robin semifinals in the collegiate division gets underway at the University of San Carlos (USC) Gym as teams try to bolster their finals chances.
In women’s play, the defending champions Southwestern University (SWU)-Phinma and last year’s finalist the University of San Jose-Recoletos (USJ-R) hope to set up another championship dogfight as they take on separate opponents in the morning.
SWU-Phinma, which is gunning for an unprecedented five-peat, will be battling the winless USC while USJ-R guns for revenge against the University of Southern Philippines Foundation (USPF), which outlasted the Jaguars in five sets in the elimination round.
A victory by the Lady Jaguars and the Lady Cobras will automatically eliminate USPF and USC from finals contention.
Currently, USJ-R and SWU-Phinma are tied at the top with 1-0 (win-loss) slates while USC and USPF hold a 0-1 (win-loss) records.
In the men’s division, defending champion USJ-R and SWU-Phinma look to return to the finals as they battle each other at 1:30 p.m. while the Cebu Institute of Technology-University (CIT-U) and the University of the Visayas (UV) aim to keep their title bids alive as they square up at 3:30 p.m.
The top two teams after the round-robin semifinals will advance to the best-of-three finals which will start on November 19.