A group of young players coming from Mindanao Autonomous College Foundation will beef up the Basilan team in the new season of the Pilipinas VisMin Cup, which tips off March 19 in Zamboanga City.

These young players, according to team owner Dr. Ibrahim Hassan Jr., a general surgeon and the unversity's president, are mostly student athletes.

Hassan's main thrust is to showcase the talent of homegrown players with barely an opportunity to compete in major leagues; he believes the VisMin Cup will be great platform to prove themselves.

"We want to showcase our homegrown talents," Dr. Hassan told ABS-CBN News in a telephone interview. "But, of course, we intend to put up a competitive team in the VisMin Cup. We'll select the best of the best from our local players, then will tap an import for the coming tournament."

Moustapha Arafat, who reinforced the University of the East at one time, will be leading a young group of players to compete against the big boys in the VisMin Cup.

The 6-foot-7 Arafat is a player who can play inside and out and will be an asset to the Basilan Golden Lion squad.

Besides Arafat, Basilan also tapped the services of Joewish Gracia, Jeoffrey Acain and Enrique Caunan Jr.

Gracia previously saw action for the Zamboanga Valientes in the league's first season.

Acain played for the Kapatagan Buffalo in the league's Mindanao Leg last year while Caunan is a big man who previously played for the Zamboanga-Sibugay team that also competed in the Mindanao leg.

In forming their team, Hassan used the “yakan” — a product indigenous to Basilan which came from woven materials — as a symbol and inspiration.

" ’Yung team namin, para kaming pieces of clothes na pinagtagpi-tagpi before coming up with a beautiful yakan," Hassan added. "That's a symbol we want to use in building our team."

"We would like to show the good side of Basilan. It's beautiful and peaceful. We want to erase the memory of not so good experience we had in this province."

Basilan used to be a conflict-riddled province but has slowly gotten to its feet, using sports and tourism to show its more pleasant side.