No verdict yet as UAAP Board set to review UST bubble probe report

FILE – UST Growling Tigers during the UAAP Season 82 men’s basketball finals. INQUIRER PHOTO

The UAAP on Tuesday said it received the probe report by University of Santo Tomas regarding its men’s basketball team’s alleged bubble training camp in Sorsogon.

But the verdict will have to wait a little longer as the UAAP Board of Managing Directors will meet again on Thursday to review the UST report as well as National University’s and “tackle other related cases before taking pertinent actions.”

The league on Tuesday held a meeting with the Inter-Agency Task Force, Philippine Sports Commission, Games and Amusements Board, Department of Health (DOH) and the Commissioner on Higher Education regarding the reported breach of quarantine protocols.

“The UAAP acknowledges the efforts of UST and NU  in participating at the meeting requested by PSC, GAB and DOH concerning compliance with government-issued guidelines and protocols on the conduct of school and athletic activities during the community quarantine,” the league said in a statement released Tuesday night.

“The meeting was an important step towards the resolution of these issues that concern student-athletes of UAAP member-schools.”

NU, whose women’s volleyball team is in hot water for facing the same allegation when it reportedly held its own training camp in its Laguna campus amid the coronavirus pandemic, attended the meeting and is also expected to submit its own findings.

The various government agencies involved have also received a copy of the report submitted by UST.

The controversy involving the Growling Tigers has caused an exodus of players, including former skipper CJ Cansino and rising star Rhenz Abando.

Cansino, who claimed to have been cut from the team for insisting on going home to his family, is now with University of the Philippines.

Guard Brent Paraiso and big man Ira Bataller have also left the Tigers, who just last year had an inspiring finals run in the UAAP Season 82.