{"id":247979,"date":"2020-03-11T23:45:18","date_gmt":"2020-03-12T03:45:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=247979"},"modified":"2020-03-11T23:45:18","modified_gmt":"2020-03-12T03:45:18","slug":"pba-postpones-games-indefinitely","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2020\/03\/11\/pba-postpones-games-indefinitely\/","title":{"rendered":"PBA postpones games indefinitely"},"content":{"rendered":"
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PBA Commissioner Willie Marcial said the decision was made after a lengthy emergency meeting set by the league’s board of governors. (File photo: Markus Spiske\/Unsplash)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

MANILA<\/strong>\u00a0\u2013 The Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) announced on Wednesday that it will postpone all its activities in the 5×5 and even the 3×3 scenes indefinitely due to the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19).<\/p>\n

PBA Commissioner Willie Marcial said the decision was made after a lengthy emergency meeting set by the league’s board of governors.<\/p>\n

“Nag-meeting kami kahapon<\/em>\u00a0[nang] 9 [p.m.]\u00a0Tumagal siguro nang mga tatlo’t kalahating oras<\/em>\u00a0(We met at 9 p.m. last night. It probably lasted for three and a half hours),” Marcial said in a press conference at the PBA office in Quezon City on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

He said the board tackled possible options, including shorter postponements and the possibility of still pushing through with the scheduled games although in a closed-door setting similar to the Gilas Pilipinas Men’s FIBA World Cup Qualifiers match against Qatar in 2018.<\/p>\n

The Philippine Super Liga already opted to take the closed-door route in its matches in the Grand Prix conference, while a Philippines Football League club, Ceres Negros, moved to hold its AFC Cup game against Bali United behind closed doors later Wednesday.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, persons privy to the matter told the Philippine News Agency that Maharlika Pilipinas Basketball League said San Juan Knights are also considering holding Game 2 of the league’s North Division Finals against the Makati Skyscrapers also later Wednesday at the FilOil Flying V Centre behind closed doors.<\/p>\n

Supposed to take place at the Makati Coliseum, San Juan suddenly got the hosting rights for the said match due to the unavailability of the said arena.<\/p>\n

The development came two days after the FilOil Flying V Centre also put Game 2 of the UAAP boys basketball finals behind closed doors.<\/p>\n

Asked why the PBA decided to suspend the games, Marcial said,\u00a0“Nakita ng<\/em>\u00a0board of governors\u00a0kung ano ang iko<\/em>-consider\u00a0nila:<\/em>\u00a0safety\u00a0ng lahat–hindi lang<\/em>\u00a0players, fans,\u00a0pati mga<\/em>\u00a0referees, so\u00a0mas makakabuti na<\/em>\u00a0suspended\u00a0muna yung<\/em>\u00a0games (The board of governors saw what to consider: the safety of everyone–not just the players and the fans but also the referees, so it was for the better that the games should be suspended).”<\/p>\n

Among those affected by the suspension are the ongoing PBA Philippine Cup, the ongoing PBA D-League Aspirants Cup, and the upcoming PBA 3×3 First Conference.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MANILA\u00a0\u2013 The Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) announced on Wednesday that it will postpone all its activities in the 5×5 and …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":240750,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-247979","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","mauthors-ivan-stewart-saldajeno","mauthors-philippine-news-agency"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247979","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=247979"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247979\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":247984,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247979\/revisions\/247984"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/240750"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=247979"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=247979"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=247979"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}