SEVERAL new teams will test the mettle of the more established ones in Season 23 of Cebu’s most prestigious inter-school league, the Cebu Schools Athletic Foundation Inc. (Cesafi), which kicks off its brand-new season on Saturday afternoon, Sept. 23, 2023, at the Cebu Coliseum.
The first game at 4 p.m. will be a battle in the high school division between Don Bosco and Cebu Eastern College. This will be followed by a showdown between two new teams in the collegiate division: Verallo College and Roosevelt College.
“The 23rd season of Cesafi promises to be the most exciting and most competitive with the old teams going against new teams,” league president Paulino Yabao said in a press conference on Thursday, Sept. 21, at the Cebu Country Club.
The collegiate division will have four new schools competing for the title. These are the Cebu Roosevelt Memorial Colleges, Felipe R. Verallo Foundation College, the Benedicto College and the University of the Philippines-Cebu.
All eyes, though, remain on the defending champions, the University of the Visayas, with head coach Gary Cortes declaring his team ready to take on all comers.
“As the defending champion, our success will depend on how our players will perform and, of course, how our opponents will also play. As long as we stay healthy, the team will really put up a good fight,” said Cortes.
Paul Flores, the coach of Roosevelt, said they’re aware of the challenges that come with joining a big league like Cesafi, and his team has prepared well for this.
“We will give our very best. We prepared a lot, knowing that this is not going to be an easy journey going up against the big teams. We will see what will happen, but definitely, we also prepared hard for this,” said Flores.
Cesafi commissioner Felix Tiukinhoy also announced that the league is advocating for a cleaner environment, hence the theme “Eyes on the Gold, Green is the Goal.”
“The theme for this year is ‘eyes on the gold, green is the goal.’ That means, starting this year, we will go green. We will be environment-friendly by banning single-use plastic bottles in all venues of our games. Not only in the venues but we will also encourage our member schools to do that,” said Tiukinhoy. / JNP