A YEAR after a harrowing season, the Southwestern University Baby Cobras are knocking once again on the doors of the Cebu Schools Athletic Foundation Inc. (Cesafi) hoping to gain back its good standing in the league.
They are so determined to rise from the ashes of a failed attempt to return to the high school wars, that the Baby Cobras went through a more thorough screening to make sure they have legitimate players this time.
Last year, five players were found to have doctored their credentials in an attempt to deceive the league of their real age.
However, they were unlucky as the trained eyes of the screening committee could not be deceived by cheap attempts.
With the Baby Cobras’ return, there will now be 10 teams fighting for the high school division title given that there won’t be any problems with players’ documents.
SWU’s entry is now reflected on the full schedule of games for the basketball tournament for the 2016 season as released by Cesafi Commissioner Felix Tiukinhoy yesterday.
The Baby Cobras will debut on Aug. 11 against the 2010 champions Cebu Eastern College Dragons.
The SWU high school team left the league after Cesafi’s inaugural season in 2001.
The season will officially begin on Aug. 6 and will run until Oct. 22 or later, depending on the weather and other important events that would force the cancellation of games.
The opening games will feature the rejuvenated Don Bosco Technological Center Greywolves and the University of San Carlos Baby Warriors for the high school division wars at 4 p.m. to be followed by the University of San Jose-Recoletos and University of Cebu Webmasters game at 5:30 p.m.
The most awaited games between last year’s championship protagonists — Sacred Heart School-Ateneo de Cebu Magis Eagles and UC Baby Webmasters in the high school division and USC Warriors and UV Green Lancers — will have to wait until Aug. 16 and Aug. 28 respectively.
The marquee match-up between the SWU Cobras and the Warriors will be on Aug. 7.