UAAP ends thrice-to-beat edge, moves singing of school hymn to pre-game

MANILA, Philippines – The UAAP is introducing two big changes when the 79th season of the collegiate sports league opens this weekend.

In a press conference on Tuesday, August 30, UAAP board president Fr Ermito De Sagon, OP, of host school UST said that the league will no longer utilize the thrice-to-beat advantage given to a team who sweeps an elimination round, and that the singing of the school hymns will now take place before warm-ups as opposed to post-game.

“First, we have done away with the thrice-to-beat theme if ever there is a team that sweeps the elimination round,” he said, also indicating that this will be the case for all sports.

In the league’s previous rules, a team who, for example, sweeps all 14 games in the men’s basketball eliminations will earn an automatic berth to the finals where it will have a thrice-to-beat edge against its opponent, who would only have to lose twice to be eliminated.

“We thought that is too much and it ends up like being best-of-4 and hindi siya magandang (it’s not a nice) best-of-4. It’s [now] actually back to zero, and then they begin a championship game, and whoever wins two games is the champion,” De Sagon said.

Moving forward, a team who sweeps the elimination round will still receive an automatic ticket to the finals, but once there, the series becomes a best-of-3.

In such a situation, a stepladder format will be used to determine which school will face the undefeated team in the finals. The number 4 seed will take on the number 3 in a knockout game, and the winner of that contest will face the number two seed, who will have a twice-to-beat advantage, for a ticket to the title round.

On no longer having the singing of the school hymns after the game, De Sagon said, “We noticed that may not be the best time to sing the hymns because everybody is tired… So we decided that, sort of like in volleyball, we do it this way: before the official warm-up, the two teams will be called at the center of the court, and then the hymn – it starts always with the one wearing the light uniform.”

The UAAP board president added that the teams can still sing their hymns after the game, if desired. “That’s the problem of the school, but really at the beginning, that will be the official.”

De Sagon added that singing school hymns before the game would be better, as winning and losing teams are unable to fully concentrate on it when done post-match.

“The winning team, they do so many other things instead of singing immediately their hymn, and the losing team would like to disappear and then could not disappear because they have to wait and sing their hymn later on,” he explained.

The new practice will take place before the first men’s basketball game of the season on Sunday, September 4, between Adamson and UP. – Rappler.com