The Varsitarian

COURTSIDE queen Patricia Cansana is back to deliver UAAP news straight from the Tigers’ bench.

Now on her second stint as a UAAP correspondent, the fifth-year Architecture student is one of the five lucky courtside reporters who kept their job without going through another audition process.

“My confidence level rose up so expect me to smile more,” she said.

Under the rules of the ABS- CBN TV network, the decision to retain a courtside reporter will be based on his or her performance in the last season. Cansana’s impressive reporting debut last year apparently spoke for itself.

For her, pressure is inevitable in front of the camera not because she’s intimidated by other reporters, but because she’s there to carry the name of the school.

“It’s different when I’m in Araneta (Coliseum),” she said. “I can still commit mistakes and still get nervous. But the feeling is more of excitement. Just the thought of representing the school pressures me.”

Growing up in a male-dominated family, Cansana’s passion for the sport stemmed from childhood as she learned her Basketball 101 courtesy of her father and her brother.

“I think I acquired enough knowledge in basketball because I was exposed to it when I was still young,” she said. “I used to play the sport with my dad and my brother.”

Although this graduating student has set academics as her priority right now, she said she would match her intensity and perseverance last season.

“My performance will still be the same as last year’s, but perhaps with some improvement in conducting my report given the training I had for a year,” she said. Anne Marie Carmela L. Dayauon