NCAA eyes adding esports, non contact events for Season 96

FILE – NCAA Season 95 opening ceremony. Photo by Tristan Tamayo/INQUIRER.net

The NCAA said it is considering adding more sports to next year’s calendar after announcing earlier that only four mandatory events will be played in Season 96.

During the PSA Forum webcast on Tuesday, NCAA Management Committee (ManCom) chairman Fr. Vic Calvo OP of Letran said sports with less contact as tennis, chess, badminton and table tennis may be held as the country continues to deal with coronavirus pandemic.

“Nothing is fixed yet. We are fluid. We are on serving whatever the situation so the NCAA can push through,” said the Calvo. “We’re a living organism. The NCAA is not dead.”

The country’s oldest collegiate league has decided to push next year’s opening to first quarter of 2021 due to the pandemic with only basketball, volleyball, athletics and swimming on tap.

Sports like online chess and esports, which delivered medals in the 2019 Southeast Asian Games, are also being considered by the NCAA.

“We did this during the SEA Games. We even became champions, so why not do this especially in the time of the pandemic,” said Calvo.

But events like relays in swimming and track and field and doubles in lawn tennis and badminton may be scrapped.

The NCAA canceled the remainder Season 85 last March amid the strict lockdowns in Metro Manila due to the coronavirus crisis.