The 46th season of the PBA tips off on Friday at the Ynares Sports Arena in Pasig City. In these unprecedented times, the league decided to hold tripleheaders for most of the elimination round, moving the games to an early start time.
Due to the changes in the conduct of the season, adjustments to the TV coverage of the games became necessary. With the changes to the usual schedule of games, here is the rundown on how and where to watch the PBA games this season.
2021 PBA Philippine Cup Playoffs
In the first round of the playoffs, No. 1 TNT Tropang Giga will face either Barangay Ginebra or Phoenix Super LPG.
No. 2 Meralco will also have a twice-to-beat edge against No. 7 NLEX.
The other two quarterfinals match-ups are between No.3 Magnolia and No. 6 Rain or Shine and between No. 4 San Miguel and No. 5 NorthPort.
Wednesdays and Fridays
Weekday games will be starting at an earlier time of 12:30 p.m., and for those matches, ONE Sports and PBA Rush on cable television provider Cignal will be providing the live coverage.
As for the second and third games at a 3 p.m. and 6 p.m. start time, the games will be on TV5 as well as on PBA Rush.
Saturdays
The games every Saturday will start at 2 p.m. and 4:35 p.m. with both matches to be aired on ONE Sports and PBA Rush. TV5 will not be broadcasting the Saturday games.
Sundays
The 2 p.m. and 4:35 p.m. games will be aired on TV5 and its sister channels in Cignal's lineup. However, the third game at 7 p.m. will only be aired on PBA Rush.
How about livestream?
All the PBA games will be streamed live on the Cignal Play app, which can be downloaded for free on the App Store and Google Play Store. You would need to sign up and register an account, but the service is free, too.
SMART subscribers can also watch the games live by logging on to GigaFest.Smart.
Is the livestream still available on Facebook?
We asked the PBA and officials said the livestream will still be available on Facebook. But instead of the league’s page, you can catch the livestream via the Puso Pilipinas and SMART Sports pages. But these games on Facebook, according to the league, are only available to Philippine viewers.