If the UAAP wants to open Season 89 with a bang, Vice Ganda is ready to turn the SM Mall of Asia Arena into her own halftime stage.
Call it the “Super Unkaboga-Bowl.”
With one of the Philippines’ biggest entertainment icons leading the charge, Far Eastern University is promising a kickoff show that aims to feel less like a traditional sports opening and more like a Super Bowl halftime show or the opening ceremony of a UEFA Champions League Final when the league officially opens its new chapter on Saturday.
The festivities begin at 5 p.m., with Vice Ganda and gloc-9 headlining a star-studded lineup of performances designed to usher in a brand-new UAAP season.
More than a curtain-raiser, the show will spotlight FEU’s artistic side while setting the tone for Season 89’s theme, “For Everyone, UAAP.”
The theme reminds everyone that the UAAP is not defined solely by the student-athletes who take the court, field, pool, or track, but by the entire community that makes collegiate sports possible.
“It underscores, alam ninyo naman sa FEU, very inclusive, everybody is important,” UAAP Season 89 President Mark Molina said during the university’s “Tam Rally” earlier this week.
“When you talk about the UAAP, you always see the basketball players, the volleyball players, but we don’t see the people who made them successful. Everyone in the community is very important; that’s why we have successful teams: teachers, students, drivers, yung nagluto sa canteen. Lahat ito importante. Lahat ito part ng FEU community, part of UAAP community. That’s why we have that theme.”
(C) UAAP Season 89 Media Team
And FEU intends to make that message impossible to miss.
“We are going to put on a show. Saturday will see the artistic side of FEU. It will be a celebration of the artistic side of FEU. And after that, on September 13, it’s going to be a showcase of the athletic side of FEU. This is what’s in store in Season 89,” Molina added.
The spectacle will serve as the opening act for what promises to be another packed UAAP calendar, with the men’s basketball tournament tipping off Sunday with a tripleheader at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.
FEU will make its first appearance at noon against Adamson University, with coach Sean Chambers parading an intact Tamaraws roster led by reigning MVP Janrey Pasaol and boosted by the arrival of Season 88 high school boys MVP Cabs Cabonilas.
Two rematches of last season’s Final Four will then take center stage.
Defending champion De La Salle University begins its bid for back-to-back titles against National University at 2:30 p.m., before preseason favorites University of the Philippines and University of Santo Tomas renew their rivalry at 6 p.m.
For FEU, however, Season 89 is about more than simply putting together a memorable opening weekend.
The university is also looking to make its mark across the various sports it will enter throughout the season, building on several years of strong performances in both the collegiate and high school divisions.
“I hope we will win a lot of championships again. We have been doing well in the past few years, both in high school in college. We have been very competitive. Almost all of our teams are in the podium or in the Final Four,” Molina said.
