Cignal faces Creamline in Game 1 of All-Filipino Conference finals

Games on Tuesday
(Smart Araneta Coliseum)
3 p.m. – Farm Fresh vs PLDT (Battle for 3^rd)
5:30 p.m. – Cignal vs Creamline (Finals)

VANIE GANDLER and the Cignal Super Spikers have been praying long and hard to end its PVL championship drought.

But they also knew that when you pray for the rain, you got to deal with the mud too.

“Our focus isn’t just making it to the finals, we pray for a championship,” said Ms. Gandler, whose Manuel V. Pangilinan-owned club clashes with championship-tested Creamline on Tuesday in Game One of their best-of-three PVL All-Filipino Conference finals at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.

“But that comes with challenges, and we have to play like champions,” the Alas Pilipinas star added.

This finale, set at 5:30 p.m., will be Cignal’s third shot at the crown that has eluded the franchise since it joined the league five years ago.

It made it to the finals twice, the first in the 2022 Reinforced Conference and the other in the 2024 Invitational, but was denied the same number of times.

Now this is their chance that Ms. Gandler and her merry bunch wouldn’t want to just slip away again.

“It means the world to me because I see the qualities of a champion in each one of my teammates, they’ve made me a better player and person,” she said.

But pulling the rug from under the Creamline Cool Smashers is easier said than done as they seemed to know how to do it being in the finals for the 15^th time and winning a league record of 10 championships.

And an 11^th one could just be around the corner.

“Our goal is to really win the championship in this conference,” said Creamline’s prolific spiker Bernadeth Pons.

Meanwhile, Farm Fresh and PLDT battle it out for third place at 3 p.m.

Game Two is on Thursday while a decider, if necessary, will be on April 28 all at the Big Dome. — Joey Villar