Cecile Cruzada is the lone female head coach in the 2022 Spikers' Turf Open Conference.
In a league for men, which translates to bench tacticians being also dominated by men, Cruzada took the risk.
However, taking the risk was not always the case from the start.
She revealed after Navy's straight sets win over Ateneo-Fudgee Barr on Thursday that she was hesitant at first to take the offer of manning the sidelines for Navy.
“Sa totoo lang, hindi ko sana tatanggapin kasi nga lalaki sila,” said Cruzada in the postgame interview.
But the Navy players themselves were the ones that pushed her to take the job, not really caring about her gender.
And since she agreed to take the helm, it has become an exchange of ideas at Navy's huddles, with both players and coaches trading inputs.
“Actually iba kasi ‘yung capacity babae, iba ‘yung sa lalaki so sinasabihan ko sila na tulungan nila ako, kung ano pa ‘yung kulang ko, sabihan nila ako,” said Cruzada, who was once an assistant coach for Iriga City in the PVL.
“Dahil sa tulong nila na pag motivate nila sa akin, nagawa namin ‘yung magandang program namin.”
Cruzada then shared that some of her coaching smarts, she got from a volleyball coaching legend - Roger Gorayeb.
She was coached by Gorayeb before in beach volleyball and all the things she learned from him, she is now passing to the Navy players led by Jao Umandal and Joeven Dela Vega.
“Kay Coach Roger kasi ‘yung mga motivation sa players kasi once na magaling ka rin magmotivate sa player mo, pag mamotivate mo sila bumabalik ‘yung laro nila,” expressed Cruzada.
“‘Yun po ang number 1 na nakuha ko kay Coach Roger.”
