Marck Espejo spent most of the match on the bench resting an aching Achilles' heel but his absence was barely felt as Cignal easily dismantled VNS One-Alicia, 25-20, 26-24, 25-18, to fuel its championship drive in the Spikers' Turf Open Conference on Saturday at the Paco Arena.

The defending champions turned to Louie Ramirez and JP Bugaoan to fill in the scoring role left by Espejo, who hurt his foot in the HD Spikers' stinging five-set loss to National University-Sta. Elena Thursday in the round robin semifinals opener.

"This week has been an exhausting one for us. It's a good morale boost that we're able to get the win after that painful loss last Thursday," said Cignal coach Dexter Clamor.

Ramirez led the HD Spikers with 16 points off 13-of-26 spiking clip while Bugaoan posted 13 markers.

"Everyone performed well and we're able to execute what we practiced," said Ramirez.

Espejo was limited to just one point.

The Griffins suffered their second straight defeat to fall out of contention in the Finals race.

Benedict San Andres and Kevin Montemayor finished with 11 points each for VNS.