The Filoil EcoOil Preseason Cup (formerly known as the Homegrown Cup, the Filoil Flying V Preseason Cup, and also known as the Filoil EcoOil ECJ Preseason Cup in 2024) is a pre-season inter-collegiate basketball tournament in the

Philippines The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...

. It is contested by teams mainly from the

University Athletic Association of the Philippines The University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP), established in 1938, is an athletic association of eight Metro Manila universities in the Philippines. The eight-member schools are Adamson University (AdU), Ateneo de Manila Univ ...

(UAAP) and the

National Collegiate Athletic Association The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates College athletics in the United States, student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, and Simon Fraser University, 1 in Canada. ...

(NCAA), there have also been some invited teams such as the RP Youth under-18 team and teams from other associations. The

UP Fighting Maroons The UP Fighting Maroons are the collegiate varsity teams of the University of the Philippines Diliman. The teams play in the University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP), the Philippines' premier college sports league. UP is one o ...

are the current defending champions, becoming the second team to win back-to-back titles in 2023 and 2024. The

De La Salle Green Archers The De La Salle Green Archers and Lady Archers are the varsity teams representing De La Salle University in the University Athletic Association of the Philippines, among other leagues. The "Green Archer" is the traditional university mascot. Whi ...

are the most succeessful team with four titles.

History

The entire tournament is organized by Filoil EcoOil Sports, formerly Filoil Flyving V Sports, of the Villavicencio Group of Companies. It was first held as a post-season tournament in 2006 where it was known as the

Homegrown Cup The Homegrown Invitational Cup is a collegiate basketball tournament in the Philippines. It aims to determine which is the best "homegrown" collegiate team. Homegrown players are those who came directly from the juniors team of the said school. As ...

. Starting in 2007, Filoil Flying V Sports decided to hold it every summer and it was subsequently renamed as the Filoil Flying V Preseason Cup. The

won the first two editions of the tournament, making them, to this day, the only back-to-back tournament champions. The

UE Red Warriors The UE Red Warriors, Lady Warriors, Junior Warriors and Lady Junior Warriors are the collegiate men's and women's, and high school men's and women's, respectively, varsity teams of the University of the East (UE) that play in the University Athle ...

won the third edition of the tournament in 2008, followed by the

FEU Tamaraws The FEU Tamaraws and Lady Tamaraws are the varsity teams of Far Eastern University in the University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP). The university's high school varsity teams are called the ''FEU-D Baby Tamaraws, Baby Tamaraws'' ...

in 2009, the

San Sebastian Stags The San Sebastian Golden Stags and Lady Stags, also known collectively as the SSC-R Stags, are the National Collegiate Athletic Association (Philippines) varsity teams of the San Sebastian College – Recoletos. Their five consecutive NCAA senio ...

in 2010, the

Ateneo Blue Eagles The Ateneo Blue Eagles are the collegiate varsity teams of the Ateneo de Manila University that play in the University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP), the premiere collegiate league in the Philippines. The Ateneo collegiate ...

in 2011, and the

NU Bulldogs The NU Bulldogs, Lady Bulldogs, Bullpups and Lady Bullpups are the collegiate men's and women's, and high school men's and women's, respectively, varsity teams of National University (NU) in the University Athletic Association of the Philippin ...

in 2012. UE would reclaim the title in 2013 before starting a period from 2014 through 2019 where five of the six tournaments held were won by either De La Salle or the

San Beda Red Lions The San Beda Red Lions and Lionesses are the collegiate varsity teams of the San Beda University, best known for their basketball section.Malonso, J. ''"NCAA: A HISTORY''". NCAA(Phils) Homepage. Online. Internet. Accessed 23 May 200NCAA Philippi ...

. De La Salle claimed their fourth in

2016 2016 was designated as: * International Year of Pulses by the sixty-eighth session of the United Nations General Assembly. * International Year of Global Understanding (IYGU) by the International Council for Science (ICSU), the Internationa ...

, the most out of any school, while San Beda won three in five years. The only outlier during this period was Ateneo in 2018. The 2020 and 2021 editions of the tournament were cancelled due to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

, before resuming with its 15th edition in 2022, where it was also rebranded as the Filoil EcoOil Preseason Cup, in which NU would win. In 2024, it was announced that the 17th edition of the tournament would be named after Eduardo Cojuangco Jr., renaming it as the ECJ Preseason Cup. The

would win both the 2023 and 2024 editions, making them just the second back-to-back Preseason Cup champions.

Tournament format

All participating teams are divided into two groups. Since 2023, teams are grouped based on association. The single

round-robin tournament A round-robin tournament or all-play-all tournament is a competition format in which each contestant meets every other participant, usually in turn.''Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged'' (1971, G. & ...

is used for each group. The top four teams from each group advance to the single-elimination playoffs. The first round, the crossover quarterfinals, have the first-seeded teams matched against the fourth-seeded teams from the opposing group. The same is also applied for the second-seeded and third-seeded teams. The winner of each game advances to the next round until one team remains to become the Preseason Cup champion.

Results

By tournament

By school

Media coverage

The tournament has had multiple media coverage partners over the years, beginning with

ABS-CBN ABS-CBN is a leading Philippine media and content company. It serves as the flagship media brand of ABS-CBN Corporation, a subsidiary of Lopez Holdings Corporation. Once the country's largest free-to-air television network, ABS-CBN has since ...

, whose now-defunct sports division was a broadcast partner from 2006 until 2016. The tournament was left without a broadcast partner in 2017, before signing a deal with

ESPN5 One Sports (formerly ABC Sports from 2004 to 2008, Sports5 from 2011 to 2017 and ESPN5 from 2017 to 2020) is the sports division of TV5 Network, Inc. and jointly-operated with sister company Cignal TV. One Sports supplies and airs major spo ...

for 2018 and 2019. The 2023 edition was then broadcast by

Solar Sports Solar Sports is a Philippines, Philippine Digital television, digital free-to-air television network based in Shaw Boulevard, Mandaluyong, Philippines. It serves as the flagship network of Southern Broadcasting Network, a subsidiary of Solar En ...

References

{{Basketball in the Philippines Recurring sporting events established in 2007 College men's basketball competitions in the Philippines