National Collegiate Champ?
Bleacher Talk
Published February 26, 2006
National Collegiate Champ?
Mirror, mirror on the wall, who's the best college team of them all? Hmmm. It's a simple question but will admittedly meet resistance, difficulty and a lot of controversy. Because up until today, the basketball community can't come up with a common answer.
If we are to base it on the tournament organized by the Philippine Basketball Federation (PBF), UAAP champions Far Eastern University (FEU) should be considered as the best team since it defeated Letran yesterday in the finals of the National Students Basketball Championship. Moreover, they also won the UAAP championship, the most prestigious collegiate league of local basketball.
But if the Basketball Association of the Philippines (BAP) is to be asked, they'll say the "official" tournament has yet to kick off in Legazpi on Tuesday. The pre-tournament favorites there are National University (NU), the Mapua Institute of Technology (MIT) and Universityof Perpetual Help. Cebu's representative to this tournament is the University of San Carlos (USC).
So how does the ordinary basketball fan analyze the situation on hand? While basketball fans have always wanted to determine a genuine national champion, he ends up more confused with so many champions being declared. The amateur basketball scene is turning out to be just like boxing, a sport with so many alphabet organizations declaring its own champions. We have the UAAP, NCAA, CESAFI, NCRAA, CUSA, NCAA-South, HAIL, and so much more. And the sad part is that all these organizations can't seem to bond together to find one common and true national champion.
And so we'll have to take the most logical and common sense way to find out who's who. I'd like to use the Manny Pacquiao case as a comparison. Pacquiao doesn't own an official world title from any of boxing's recognized organizations: WBC, WBA, IBF or WBO. While he holds the WBC International super featherweight championship, it still isn't a world championship. In fact, it's still second fiddle to Marco Antonio Barrera's WBC championship from an official standpoint. But everyone recognizes him as a world champion, and it's not a biased stance coming out of the Philippines. The Ring magazine rates the Pacman above all the other super featherweight champions, and so do other boxing analysts found in websites and publications.
The national collegiate scene is a little more complicated though. The main issue that makes it difficult to declare a national champion is that most, if not all, college teams consider their respective local league championships as the most important goal to achieve. It's no secret that FEU and Letran consider their respective UAAP and NCAA championships more valuable than any other championship. It's glamorous, well-followed and televised on national TV.
On the other hand, a championship from this "other" national tournament now becomes a meager "bonus." Worse, we now have an annual practice of holding two tournaments claiming to be a "national" championship.
The most logical way to determine a national champion is for the champions of the different collegiate leagues to clash in a season-ending tournament shortly after the end of their respective league championships. I would still want to see the FEU team featuring Arwind Santos, Mark Isip and RJ Rizada clash with all the other champions on a pre-agreed date shortly after the end of the UAAP season. If all major leagues could agree on a common schedule, we could have all champions under one roof and at the peak of their games.
In the absence of this logical path, the alternative way to determine a national champion (for now) is to make an assessment on the various league champions at the height of their achievements. And so just like the Pacquiao case, it's safe to consider FEU as a national champion after beating De La Salle in the UAAP Finals last October. NCAA champion Letran will surely question this, but the best way to have proven who's who was if both teams clashed right after the end of both UAAP and NCAA tournaments. I'd really like to push for UV, but their trips to the past three years of the Champions' League and last week's participation latest trip have always produced no more than a top three finish. But that's another issue to tackle later.
Another schoolyear will be ending in a matter of weeks, and another year will go by where we still can't determine a national champion in the most logical way. The big question now is if we'll ever get over this hump.***Time-out: We're asking all to pray for the soul of our colleague, the late Atty. Manuel "Maning" Oyson. >>> Happy birthday to Chuchay Verches. >>> You can reach me at http://us.f510.mail.yahoo.com/ym/Compose?To=bleachertalk@yahoo.com.
Published February 26, 2006
National Collegiate Champ?
Mirror, mirror on the wall, who's the best college team of them all? Hmmm. It's a simple question but will admittedly meet resistance, difficulty and a lot of controversy. Because up until today, the basketball community can't come up with a common answer.
If we are to base it on the tournament organized by the Philippine Basketball Federation (PBF), UAAP champions Far Eastern University (FEU) should be considered as the best team since it defeated Letran yesterday in the finals of the National Students Basketball Championship. Moreover, they also won the UAAP championship, the most prestigious collegiate league of local basketball.
But if the Basketball Association of the Philippines (BAP) is to be asked, they'll say the "official" tournament has yet to kick off in Legazpi on Tuesday. The pre-tournament favorites there are National University (NU), the Mapua Institute of Technology (MIT) and Universityof Perpetual Help. Cebu's representative to this tournament is the University of San Carlos (USC).
So how does the ordinary basketball fan analyze the situation on hand? While basketball fans have always wanted to determine a genuine national champion, he ends up more confused with so many champions being declared. The amateur basketball scene is turning out to be just like boxing, a sport with so many alphabet organizations declaring its own champions. We have the UAAP, NCAA, CESAFI, NCRAA, CUSA, NCAA-South, HAIL, and so much more. And the sad part is that all these organizations can't seem to bond together to find one common and true national champion.
And so we'll have to take the most logical and common sense way to find out who's who. I'd like to use the Manny Pacquiao case as a comparison. Pacquiao doesn't own an official world title from any of boxing's recognized organizations: WBC, WBA, IBF or WBO. While he holds the WBC International super featherweight championship, it still isn't a world championship. In fact, it's still second fiddle to Marco Antonio Barrera's WBC championship from an official standpoint. But everyone recognizes him as a world champion, and it's not a biased stance coming out of the Philippines. The Ring magazine rates the Pacman above all the other super featherweight champions, and so do other boxing analysts found in websites and publications.
The national collegiate scene is a little more complicated though. The main issue that makes it difficult to declare a national champion is that most, if not all, college teams consider their respective local league championships as the most important goal to achieve. It's no secret that FEU and Letran consider their respective UAAP and NCAA championships more valuable than any other championship. It's glamorous, well-followed and televised on national TV.
On the other hand, a championship from this "other" national tournament now becomes a meager "bonus." Worse, we now have an annual practice of holding two tournaments claiming to be a "national" championship.
The most logical way to determine a national champion is for the champions of the different collegiate leagues to clash in a season-ending tournament shortly after the end of their respective league championships. I would still want to see the FEU team featuring Arwind Santos, Mark Isip and RJ Rizada clash with all the other champions on a pre-agreed date shortly after the end of the UAAP season. If all major leagues could agree on a common schedule, we could have all champions under one roof and at the peak of their games.
In the absence of this logical path, the alternative way to determine a national champion (for now) is to make an assessment on the various league champions at the height of their achievements. And so just like the Pacquiao case, it's safe to consider FEU as a national champion after beating De La Salle in the UAAP Finals last October. NCAA champion Letran will surely question this, but the best way to have proven who's who was if both teams clashed right after the end of both UAAP and NCAA tournaments. I'd really like to push for UV, but their trips to the past three years of the Champions' League and last week's participation latest trip have always produced no more than a top three finish. But that's another issue to tackle later.
Another schoolyear will be ending in a matter of weeks, and another year will go by where we still can't determine a national champion in the most logical way. The big question now is if we'll ever get over this hump.***Time-out: We're asking all to pray for the soul of our colleague, the late Atty. Manuel "Maning" Oyson. >>> Happy birthday to Chuchay Verches. >>> You can reach me at http://us.f510.mail.yahoo.com/ym/Compose?To=bleachertalk@yahoo.com.
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