Cebu youth basketball roundup

With the PBA kicking off its season today and the CESAFI Finals going into a Game 5 tonight, we thought it would be appropriate to talk about the roots or source of today’s biggest stage players. Where did they come from? How old were they when they started? Or did they suddenly become instant stars on the spot?

Today’s basketball world is so comprehensive and broad if compared to the times when we dreamed of becoming excellent basketball players. Back then, there were a handful of collegiate leagues, a semi pro league and a few tournaments for high school and elementary level students. Today, the basketball world is now broken down into a layer of different age groups, with kids playing in tournaments as early as seven to eight years old. Kids start playing competitive basketball in the Under 10 age group and they slowly but surely move up to the Under 12, 15, 17 and 19 age groups. The Under 17 age group is for high school students and is also called the “Juniors” division. The Under 15 division is also known as the “Passerelle” division while the Under 12 age group is also coined as the “Small Basketeers Philippines” of SBP division. Many of today’s college and PBA players trace their roots to these different age groups when they started to learn the ropes of the sport.

Cebu Basketball has been blessed this year with a balance of powers as far as top teams are concerned. Fresh from wining the CESAFI high school division basketball tournament is Sacred Heart School-Ateneo de Cebu which scored its second CESAFI title in four title appearances. They also won the CESAFI title in 2012 after bowing to UV in 2011 and to CEC in 2010. Could they have won the title last year? For now, we’ll have to leave this for all to speculate since we didn’t have a CESAFI title series in 2013. Aside from the CESAFI titles, the Magis Eagles also won the Palarong Pambansa gold medal in 2013 and the NBTC’s Elite League from 2010 to 2014. I guess it’s safe to say for now that the Under 17 age group has been dominated by the Magis Eagles. But who’s at the top of the other age groups?

The Under 15 or Passerelle division title of 2014 was won by the University of the Visayas in a nail-biting championship game over SHS-AdC at the BEST SBP Passerelle Twin Tournament sponsored by Milo. UV also won the Cebu and Visayas Passerelle titles in 2012 where they bowed to La Salle Greenhills in the national finals. USC won the Cebu and Visayas Passerelle titles last year and bowed to Chiang Kai Shek College in the national finals. Before UV and USC won their titles, SHS-AdC won five straight Cebu Passerelle titles from 2007 to 2011, and two national Passerelle championships in 2010 (over Xavier School) and 2011 (over Holy Child of Davao). The Passerelle division has been very fluid for the past four years with the titles being shared by UV, USC and SHS-AdC. The big question is if a school can dominate it for a long period.

Meanwhile the Under 12 or SBP division has been controlled by USC which has won the last SBP championship for the past three years (2012-2014). They have dominated the past three years in a big way, defeating all its opponents by an average of 20 points (or more). SHS-AdC had won the titles in 2010 and 2011 but no other team has come close to USC. Ongoing right now is the Alaska CYBL D-League which features a total of 74 teams playing in four age groups: Under 17, 15, 12 and 10. Also being played for the first time is a Girls Under 17 division.

From this lot, we now see Cebu youth basketball products playing in the bigger leagues. Paul Desiderio (UV-UP), Dave Yu (SHS-AdC/NU), Dawn Ochea (SHS-AdC/Adamson) and Leonard Santillan (UV) were part of the Philippine national Under 18 team that played in the FIBA Asia Under 18 Championships last August. Desiderio was also joined by Arnie Padilla (USC/SHS-AdC/FEU) in the Philippine national Under 17 team that played in the recently at the FIBA World U17 Championships. Did you see Rebreb Diputado make that crucial three point shot for NU in Game 3 of the UAAP Finals? He’s the same Diputado who played SHS-AdC in the CESAFI and Passerelle 2009 and 2010 seasons. Also in the NU-FEU series were FEU’s Roger Pogoy, Miller Dennison and Reeve Ugsang. Yu joined Diputado on the NU bench. They join a host of others playing in Manila like Koko Pingoy, Kris Porter, Henry Asilum, Julius Cadavis and others whose names we’re “forgetting” at the moment. Many of CESAFI’s college players today also strutted their talents in the youth leagues when they were younger. If you check out the USC bench at tonight’s Game 5 of the CESAFI Finals, you’ll see Kiefer Lim, Gio Laguyo, Dolan Adlawan, Prince Malana, Lucky Ecarma, and Ian Ortega.

Thanks to the support of schools, its administrators, clubs, coaches, parents and sponsors, the Cebu youth basketball scene is very much alive and kicking. We’ll hopefully produce another Dondon Hontiveros or Proctoy Quinahan soon. But while we wish that more Cebuanos do well in the sport, we also look forward to seeing them become better persons.

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Time-out: Happy birthday to my sister Dra. Joy Navarro.