Jorge's BEST Center dream lives on 

MANILA, Philippines – Nicanor Fortich Jorge knew what he wanted when he first took on the job of coaching the University of the Philippines varsity team right after graduation in the 1960s: teach kids the proper rudiments of basketball.

He believed that the Philippines was ripe for big scale basketball clinics when he coached the Maroons at age 21, fresh from his playing years with the same team and still years ahead of his coaching stints in the UAAP, NCAA and the Philippine Basketball Association.

Locally, sports clinics were unheard of then.

In 1978 when he coached the national teams for the FIBA World Championship and the Asian Games, Jorge established the Basketball Efficiency and Scientific Training Center (BEST Center) to become the pioneering clinician for cage hopefuls.

It did not take long before Jorge had seen BEST Center products dominate the sport, including the major collegiate leagues and the professional league PBA.

Jerry Codiñera, Jun Limpot, Benjie Paras, Kiefer Ravena, and Chris Tiu were just some of them. These names have inspired other younger players to hone their skills in the BEST Center and many of them have made it to collegiate hoops and some more saw action in the PBA.

"It has always been my dream to see the Filipino youth active in sports. Basketball is an avenue to greatness, but more so to discipline and to developing proper mindset and attitude in dealing with life and its challenges," Jorge said before his death in 2020, many years after he had given his full life to sports and its management, including the stretch when he served as secretary-general of the Basketball Association of the Philippines (BAP), predecessor to the Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas. of which Jorge was a co-founder. 

Forty-six years since collaborating with Milo, not only did the BEST Center conducted clinics in both basketball and volleyball, it had also given very young athletes their own leagues to strut their wares until the Covid-19 pandemic struck.

The Small Basketeers Philippines (SBP) and Passerelle competitions were relaunched, however, for their 35th edition with 11 major provinces and cities holding their own tournaments.

The 35th SBP-Passerelle twin tournaments kick off on October 12 in Roxas City to be followed by local tournaments in Bacolod, Baguio, General Santos, Cagayan de Oro/Pagadian, Davao, Iloilo, Lucena, Pampanga, Pangasinan and Zamboanga.