The Jury of Appeals created by the Negros Occidental Private Schools Sports Cultural and Educational Association to discuss the conflict arising from the men's basketball championship series will submit its recommendations to the NOPSSCEA Board today.

Jury member Pastor Edwin Madlangbayan said they have come up with their recommendations and it is up to the Board to make the final decision.

“After submitting our recommendation, the Board is expected to call for an emergency meeting and announce its decision. Hopefully, before the end of the week, the conflict will be resolved,” Madlangbayan said.

The jury was tasked to deliberate on the appeal from University of Negros Occidental-Recoletos to lift the forfeiture against the Rams after the team failed to show up for Game 2 of the best-of-three final series against defending champion West Negros University Mustangs.

UNO-R sports moderator Ericson Rios, in a letter of appeal submitted to the NOPSSCEA Board, said academic demands on their student-athletes will not permit the Rams to play on the scheduled game on Oct. 3 as it falls in the middle of the school's last week of classes before the final examination.

Rios also said that they checked with some members of the NOPSSCEA Board if permission was sought or granted for the holding of middle-of-the-week games and were informed that there was none.

Meanwhile, Madlangbayan stressed that the jury created by NOPSSCEA was solely tasked to look into the appeal of UNO-R.

He added that the NOPSSCEA Board's final decision will not affect the representation of the WNU Mustangs in the Philippine Collegiate Champions League regional championship in Dumaguete earlier this week.

As of press time, the Mustangs are playing against the University of Iloilo Wild Cats for the regional title, after beating their rivals from Ormoc in the first round.

Should the Mustangs win, they will advance to the next level, the VisMin-MetroManila qalifying zonal games.

Madlangbayan said that while NOPSSCEA recognizes the PCCL as a basketball competition among collegiate teams in the country, it does not have any official obligation to the tournament.

He added that the conflict in the men's basketball championship series between UNO-R and WNU will prompt the NOPSSCEA Board to look into other sports-related matters, including the PCCL.

“We do not have a perfect system. We hope that what happened in men's basketball will help settle differences and clarify other gray areas in our system,” Madlangbayan said.*NAB

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