A DRIVING FORCE behind the Red Sea Lions’ 20-peat in the National Athletic Collegiate Association (NCAA) Season 99 swimming tournament, all eyes were set on Jake Evangelista—the reigning Rookie of the Year and Most Valuable Athlete, contributing greatly towards the team’s “perennial successes.”
Beyond his significant strides in swimming is a guy with a heart full of dreams, hailing from the Department of Accountancy and Taxation as a freshman of San Beda University (SBU). Balancing both the demands of academics, sports, and other organizational works—one would beg to ask: how does Jake do it?
As a student-athlete who developed his passion for swimming from when he was four, Jake believed that joining the Red Sea Lions was a “good timing,” considering how SBU is “notable for joining good sporting events,” such as the NCAA, not to mention the “benefits that they provide” toward its student-athletes.
With his passion for swimming on hand, Jake took his talents in SBU as a means to uplift his environment, saying “…it is a good cause to provide something that would be beneficial not just to the people around you, but to the environment that you will be scoped with.”
In NCAA Season 99’s most recent swimming tournament, Jake managed to bag several golds in the men’s 200M Individual Medley, 100M Backstroke, silvers in 400M Individual Medley and 50M Backstroke and set a record for the 4X100 Medley Relay, thus earning him the award for MVP in three-day event. But amid this show of distinction, Jake believed that the trophy was not only his greatest achievement but the experience itself.
Straying away from the tides of the pool, Jake is also active in student-led organizations, notably currently working as a research staff for the College of Arts and Sciences’ (CAS) official student-publication, The Bedan. Having joined last November, Jake shared how campus journalism is “one of his passions” outside swimming.
Since joining The Bedan, the current volume’s sports editor, John Phoebus Villanueva, noted that Jake has been “someone that he relies on” in being “the bridge” to gather stories from coaches and other athletes. Villanueva also added how “it’s a unique opportunity to get to work with an athlete directly,” to which, in effect, allegedly “opened his perspective” on how to have better and more convenient coverages for sports moving forward.
Considering the many responsibilities that Jake has, he noted that “time management” has been the “key in striking a balance between academics, organizational works, and swimming,” further being one of the “most crucial things to have” in order to “attain success.”
“It was all the training. It was the hard works, the wake ups… the 4:00 AM wake ups that I was able to overcome,” said Jake, emphasizing how the trainings and preparations have ultimately helped in pursuit of achieving said momentous feat.
While the road ahead is long and uncertain, Jake, nonetheless, revealed how he is “driven” to be on top of his game, heading into his sophomore years with fervent anticipation for the NCAA’s centennial season, acclaiming “as Lions, we want more, but we won’t do that in a bad way, we’ll be humble as well. Come to the next season… we’ll come to season 100 not just as defenders, but as challengers.”