Teams with imports seen having strong CESAFI Final 4 chance

Mars G. Alison

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Teams with imports seen having strong CESAFI Final 4 chance
This year's 17th season of the men's basketball tournament will kick off on August 5 at the New Cebu Coliseum

CEBU CITY, Philippines – Cebu Schools Athletic Foundation Inc (CESAFI) commissioner Felix “Boy” Tiukinhoy sees teams with imports advancing to the top 4 in this year’s 17th season of the men’s basketball tournament, which will kickoff on August 5 at the New Cebu Coliseum.

Tiukinhoy is referring to the defending champion University of the Visayas (UV) Green Lancers, University of Cebu (UC) Webmasters, and the University of Southern Philippines Foundation (USPF) Panthers.

“USC (University of San Carlos Warriors), SWU (Southwestern University Phinma Cobras), and USJ-R (University of San Jose- Recoletos Jaguars) will battle for the Number 4 spot. I expect that it will be a battle to the end. And I challenge other teams to step up to the challenge,” said Tiukinhoy during the press launching of the 17th CESAFI season at the Cebu Parklane International Hotel on Friday, July 28.

It is the first time in CESAFI history that the UC Webmasters and the USPF Panthers are playing with imports in their lineup. UC has Cameroonian Frederick Ngoh Elombi who stands 6’7″ while USPF has 6’8″ tall Rich Managor of Nigeria.

The reigning CESAFI Men’s Basketball champion UV Green Lancers will still have 6’6″ tall Bassieru Sackor. The Liberian helped UV bagged its 11th CESAFI collegiate title last year.

The other university completing the 7 collegiate teams seeing action is the Cebu Institute of Technology University (CIT-U) Wildcats.   

Except for the 3 teams that Tiukinhoy believed will advance to the top 4, the rest of the teams seeing action have no imports.

Aside from the lineup, Tiukinhoy is also basing his predictions on the summer tournaments that the teams have been playing as part of their tune-up in preparation for the CESAFI tournament.

Changes to draw crowds

A number of changes will be implemented in this year’s CESAFI basketball tournament to draw back the crowd that filled the Cebu Coliseum in past seasons of the CESAFI basketball tournaments.

Aside from changing the format of the tournament, this season will also have a shorter period, with Tiukinhoy saying that the tournament will be done within the first semester of school year 2017-18.

CESAFI also assured of real time gathering of statistics which would make the players more competitive, knowing that there will now be a proper and concrete recording of the stats which will be used as one of the basis in selecting the Most Valuable Player and members of the Mythical 5.

Post game press conferences will also now be held while CESAFI will intensify their social media presence to attract students to support their teams.

Interesting opening Games

The CESAFI seems keen on bringing back the glory days of its basketball tournaments. As for its opening games, it will pit SWU-Phinma Cobras against UC Webmasters in both collegiate and junior divisions.

Making the collegiate match-up exciting is the fact that until last season, the Cobras was coached by Raul “Yayoy” Alcoseba, perhaps one of the most decorated coaches in Cebu basketball.

Early this year, Alcoseba announced his separation from the Cobras, but the summer saw him taking over the coaching reins of the Webmasters.

Alcoseba said he was surprised that this year’s opening games will pit his new team, the Webmasters, against his old team, the Cobras.

“It would be interesting,” said Alcoseba who noted that the UC Webmasters have never advanced to the top 4 in recent years.

The Cobras, on the other hand, have failed to bag the title in the past two years despite sweeping their eliminations games under Alcoseba.

Meanwhile, Viva represented by Verb del Rosario also announced that they have for this year stopped the TV coverage of CESAFI games because no one else can take care of it with the passing of Ron Nathanielsz.

Also, main sponsor for the basketball tournament will be Sun who has promised to give 20 balls for each teams including those competing in the junior division as announced by Bryan O’ Hara, who heads the Sun Prepaid Marketing.

The junior division has 10 teams. Reigning high school champions Sacred Heart School-Ateneo de Cebu (SHS-AdC) Magis Eagles, first runner-up UC Baby Webmasters, UV Baby Lancers, USC Baby Warriors, SWU-Phinma Baby Cobras, USJ-R Baby Jaguars, USPF Baby Panthers, CITU Wildkittens, Cebu Eastern College (CEC) Dragons, and the Don Bosco (DB) Greywolves.

Aside from coaches, team captains, and muses, also present during the press launching were CESAFI president Fr Dionisio Miranda SVD of USC, who urged the players to make the season memorable for themselves; and Smart’s Nancy Nacua and Lailaine Husain. – Rappler.com

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