PCAP North and South Division finals slated tonight

MANILA, Philippines – Wednesday, December 7. It’s the penultimate playdate of the Professional Chess Association of the Philippines’ third and last conference of the year.

And these four chess matches will be high quality, tough and intense. 

For the San Juan Predators and the Pasig King Pirates, the Northern Division finals will be Round 3.

San Juan met Pasig in the All-Filipino Cup that opened this second season, and the Predators devoured the King Pirates, after which they annexed their second consecutive PCAP trophy.

During the Wesley So Cup, the two met once more but this time, the King Pirates slew the Predators. With their nemesis out of the way, Pasig made the grand finals then took down the Iloilo Kisela Knights for their first trophy.

Now, it’s Round 3. Does the PCAP title go through these two teams? Most definitely.

“We never expected to be in the northern division finals as half our team is new,” said San Juan head coach Hubert Estrella. “But it is a blessing. Pasig is tough to match-up with psychologically. But we will do our best to get a good result.”

His Pasig counterpart, Franco Camillo, expressed both caution and confidence: “It is our third time to face San Juan in the division finals. So far, we’re 1-all in this. They are always a team that will contend for the title even if they have new top board players.

This will be a battle that is physical and mental. The best prepared team will win the match.”

Over at the Southern Division, the Davao Chess Eagles will battle first time division finalist, Negros Kingsmen.

Both squads are looking to book their first ever Grand Finals seat.

“Even if we defeated them twice during the elimination round, malakas yung Negros,” said Davao’s FM Sander Severino. “Tinalo nila ang Iloilo so you cannot take them lightly. This is going to be an exciting and tough southern division finals.”

On Negros’ part, co-owner Antonio Martin Olendo said: “Our deep playoff run may be attributed to the team’s long embedded title aspirations. Though Davao may pose a serious threat as we lost our elimination round matches to them this conference, we’ve come this far and we’re up for the challenge.”

“May the hungrier team win.”

The division finals of PCAP’s Open Conference can be viewed by chess fans on the league’s Facebook page as well as on the individual teams’ FB pages.