The 2008-09Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) Philippine Cup or known as the 2008-09 KFC PBA Philippine Cup for sponsorship reasons, is the first conference of the 2008-09 PBA season. It is scheduled to start on October 4 and is expected to end around February 2009. The new conference will have games on Thursday's and Saturday's. The tournament is an All-Filipino format, which doesn't require an import or a pure-foreign player for each team.
Format
The following format will be observed for the duration of the conference:
Double-round robin eliminations; 18 games per team; Teams are then seeded by basis on win-loss records. Ties are broken among points differences of the tied teams.
Teams seeded #6, #7, #8 and #9 play in a single-round robin wildcard playoffs for the final berth in the quarterfinals.
Records from the elimination round are carried over; the team that emerges at the top of the standings advances to the quarterfinals.
If a team wins all of its games but still does not emerge at the top of the group, a one-game playoff will be held between the unbeaten team and the top team.
#3, #4 and #5 teams automatically advance to the best of five quarterfinals:
#3 team vs. winner of wildcard playoffs
#4 vs. #5 teams
#1 and #2 teams automatically advance to the best of seven semifinals:
Winner of first quarterfinal vs. #1
Winner of second quarterfinal vs. #2
The winners in the semifinals advance to the best of seven Finals. The losers dispute the third-place trophy in a one-game playoff.
