What you need to know about the PBA’s 46th Season

The Philippine Basketball Association board of governors held a virtual conference on March 9, Tuesday afternoon, to inform the public about the details of the upcoming 46^th season of the PBA.

TWO CONFERENCE FORMAT
The PBA is going back to a 2-conference format for the coming season in which the board approves a four-month Philippine Cup and a six-month Governor’s Cup.

The season will be played on a " semi-bubble" with home-venue-home set-up within Metro Manila. Under a semi-bubble, all teams will only be required to travel from home to the venue during the season, with strict health protocols to be implemented.

The set-up was approved for two main reasons. First, more players prefer the planned semi-bubble compared to the last season’s bubble isolation tournament in Clark, Pampanga. Second, it will be too expensive for the league to stage another bubble.

Two venues are under negotiation as of the moment and the league is eyeing that games could have a permanent home for the season.

The league retains the Philippine Cup format of single elimination round while the Governor’s Cup will have a double-round robin elimination round. The league made no changes in the height limit for the imports which still at 6’5”.

Despite having a partnership with other network’s primetime shows, the PBA assured that games on Wednesday, Friday, and Sunday schedules will continue to be aired on ESPN5.

Start of the 46^th season is on April 11, 2021, barring the approval of the Inter-Agency Task Force. The league’s request for Season 46 under a semi-bubble set-up was already in the IATF office and in line for discussion.

PBA 3X3
The Board is looking at 12-16 teams for the inaugural season of the PBA 3x3. The games will be played every Friday and Saturday from 9:00 AM to 2:00 PM in the same venue of the 5x5 PBA games.

Alaska Aces will be the lone PBA team not joining the 3x3 tournament and in two weeks, the five new companies which will be joining the 3x3 PBA tourney will be announced by the league. Coincidently, Alaska team governor Dickie Bachmann was elected as chairman of the 3x3 despite the franchise not joining the tourney.

Meanwhile, the 3x3 team that will represent the country in the Olympic Qualifying Tournament remains to be Joshua Munzon, Alvin Pasaol, CJ Perez, and Mo Tautuaa. The FIBA 3x3 Olympic Qualifying Tournament will take place in Graz, Austria on May 26-30, 2021.

MVP PLEDGES VACCINES FOR THE PBA FAMILY
PLDT-SMART Chairman Manny V. Pangilinan has pledged to shoulder 3,000 vaccines from AstraZeneca for the players and dependents of all PBA teams.

Photo is from PBA