All-Star Game, fan voting to spice up Filoil Flying V Hanes Premier Cup

All-Star Game, fan voting to spice up Filoil Flying V Hanes Premier Cup

by rick olivares pics by paul ryan tan

The college basketball season tips off this Saturday, April 13, 2013 not only with an explosive triple-header but also with an innovative new addition to the summer games – fan voting for the Filoil/Master Game Face All-Star Basketball Challenge!

The new addition to the Filoil tournament was unveiled in a lavish press conference held at the URBN Bark and Kitchen at the Fort Strip in Bonifacio Global City yesterday.

After the NCAA moved over to AKTV, the annual Bantay Bata All-Star Game that pits the NCAA and UAAP players against each other was abandoned (with the UAAP remaining with long-time broadcast partner Studio 23). This year, the only collegiate all-star game you will get to watch is now with the country’s premier pre-season tournament – Filoil.

The Master Game Face All-Star Basketball Challenge will be played on June 8 after the elimination round of the tournament.

Players from the 18 schools competing in the Filoil tournament will team up with former college basketball icons and new Master endorsers Chris Tiu (Ateneo) and Borgie Hermida (San Beda). Chris and Borgie will then coach their own teams of all-star college basketball players.

To give the fans a more exciting and interactive participation in the all-star event, the public can select the players who will join Chris and Borgie in the Master Game Face All Star Basketball Challenge.  The 18 schools will be divided into two teams – Team Chris and Team Borgie.

Fans can create their all-star starting lineup per team by logging on to www.facebook.com/MasterPhilippines and by checking out the Game Face Application. Once in the application guests can choose a player for each starting position. The player with the highest number of votes per position will be part of the starting lineups of Chris and Borgie.

Online voting will begin on April 17. As an additional surprise, fans who correctly voted for the starting lineup player can get a chance to win two ringside tickets for the Master Game Face All-Star Basketball Challenge.

The basketball teams for Team Chris and Team Borgie are as follows:

Team Chris

·      Adamson University

·      Ateneo De Manila University

·      Colegio San Juan de Letran

·      De La Salle University

·      Lyceum of the Philippines University

·      San Sebastian College- Recolectos

·      Southwestern University

·      University of the East

·      University of Santo Tomas

Team Borgie

·      Arellano University

·      College of Saint Benilde

·      Emilio Aguinaldo College

·      Far Eastern University

·      Jose Rizal University

·      National University

·      Perpetual Help University

·      San Beda College

·      University of the Philippines

After completing the lineup, 13 reserves will each be selected by Chris and Borgie from the remaining player pool. The complete rosters of the Master Game Face Challenge will be announced on May 25.

“The fan vote will be very interesting since the fans will have so many talented players to choose from. Just at first look we have a lot of great players; Ola (Adeogun), Bobby Ray (Parks), RR (Garcia). That’s a lot of good players.” said Borgie Hermida, who led the San Beda Red Lions to four championships in the NCAA.

“I’m very excited about it. It’s a brilliant idea to get the NCAA and UAAP as well as other non member schools to participate in this one of a kind all star game,” said Tiu who skippered the Ateneo team that won the 2008 UAAP men’s basketball crown. “This is something new for the fans, something that not everyone gets to see and I look forward to that.”

“It’s going to be a very balanced game, both squads have quality players to choose from and so much talent so we’ll see what happens.” Tiu added.