3x3 pro league receives ‘A’ mark for protocols
COMMISSION on Higher Education Chairman Prospero De Vera III praised the protocols the country’s first-ever professional 3x3 basketball league Chooksto-go Pilipinas 3x3 is implementing at its training facility at the University of the Philippines Epsilon Chi Center in Quezon City.
De Vera said the league’s model could be an excellent blueprint for collegiate teams to follow as they also try to return to practice.
“What Eric Altamirano is doing at the Chooks 3x3 in UP is perfect, a must-see for amateurs,” De Vera said. Altamirano is the league commissioner.
Altamirano would himself will share on Monday the details of the Chooks-to-go Pilipinas 3x3 workout protocols to heads of collegiate leagues and to the members of the Joint Administrative Order Group.
“We will gladly do so. We are hoping to share our best practices to the amateurs,” Altamirano told Games and Amusements Board (GAB) Chairman Abraham Mitra.
Mitra and the GAB, along with the Philippine Sports Commission, Department of Health and the CHED make up the JAO Group that was tasked by the Inter Agency Task Force on the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases to handle policies for sports during the Covid-19 pandemic.
The Chooks-to-go Pilipinas 3x3’s model follows all IATF protocols starting with compulsory polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test for all players and staff and proceeds with the accomplishment of contact-tracing applications by GET Philippines.
Each player also has to go through an antigen test before entering the court and after each team’s one-hour session, the entire venue and all equipment are disinfected.
The league also submitted its return to scrimmages proposal to the JAO Group.
“Hopefully after reviewing this, we can implement it as soon as possible,” Mitra said. “Then the next step is the tournament itself. One step at a time, but we’re closing in on a return [to training and competition].”
Joining Altamiano in Monday’s meeting with the JAO Group are officials from the Philippine Basketball Association.