Farm Fresh readies rebuilt character for battle vs fancied PLDT
It may be a thing of the past now, the fact that Farm Fresh had its franchise’s best 7-1 record as the top seed of last year’s PVL Reinforced Conference elimination round, only to suffer a heartbreaking quarterfinal loss to Akari in straight sets.
For some people, it’s not an easy thing to forget.
“That game was probably the most painful one I’ve ever played. It’s not often you get to the top, and then suddenly it’s gone just like that,” Foxies superstar Trisha Tubu said.
This year, Farm Fresh, with new key additions to its roster and under the system of Japanese champion coach Koji Tsuzurabara, was on the brink of missing the top four, but won three straight games to end the 2026 All-Filipino Conference preliminaries and earn a shot at an elusive semifinals berth.
Tubu and the Foxies hope to pull off an upset against top-seeded PLDT, which finished the round with a 7-2 record, and book their first-ever semifinals ticket on Thursday, 4 p.m., at Smart Araneta Coliseum.
“We believe God has a plan,” said Tubu, who is the second-best scorer in the league with 189 points and the top spiker with 40.99% attack rate. “That’s why our eagerness to make it now is slowly growing. Like our coaches and teammates always say, there’s no easy game, no opponent can be taken lightly
“In the next phases of the conference, we’re going to take it little by little, not just hope for it, but really go all in and claim it,” she added.
Rocky start
From a rocky start early in the preliminaries, the one-and-done Adamson star, who has been with Farm Fresh since the team joined the league in 2023, admitted that they took their time building their chemistry and thriving under the guidance of Tsuzurabara, who steered Petro Gazz to an All-Filipino title last year.
The veteran coach focused on strengthening the Foxies’ character after a 5-4 finish in the classification round, where three of their four losses were heartbreaking five-set defeats
“Coach always reminds us that our real opponent isn’t the team on the other side, but ourselves. Once you overcome yourself, you can beat your opponent. That’s what we’re working on step by step, and you can see it in our games,” said Tubu.
“Our start to this conference was a bit rocky because chemistry is really the most important thing. You could see it in our five-set games where we couldn’t close it out. But because of those experiences, we grew stronger together. Now, we know how to back each other up.”
Tubu, Ces Molina, Royse Tubino, Ria Meneses, and setter Alohi Robins-Hardy will spearhead Farm Fresh against the powerhouse PLDT and its tested core of Savi Davison, Alleiah Malaluan, Mika Reyes, Majoy Baron, Kianna Dy, and Kim Fajardo.
The loser of the match will have another shot at a semifinal berth when it battles the play-in winner between Nxled and Galeries Tower.
Meanwhile, Creamline battles Cignal, a team it survived in five sets earlier behind Alyssa Valdez’s 22 points, at 6:30 p.m.
The Cool Smashers, who face a tall order as Jia De Guzman, Bernadeth Pons, and Jema Galanza remain as game-time decision due to injuries, hope to return to the semifinals after missing the top four in the Reinforced Conference.
