Brought to you by Courtyard by Marriott. Receive a special discount while visiting Gonzaga and Spokane. For details, Click Here.
With only six games left in WCC conference play, the race for seeding position for the West Coast Conference Tournament is still largely undecided. What is known, however, is that with its pair of home wins last week, and by virtue of holding the tie-breaker against St. Mary’s, the Zags assured themselves of at least a share of their fifth consecutive regular-season league championship, AND, more importantly, locked up the No. 1 seed in next month's WCC Tournament.. The Bulldogs head into Thursday’s final conference game against Portland a game and a half up on second place Saint Mary’s. Gonzaga can end St. Mary’s dream of a share of the conference title if the Zags take care of business against the Pilots. Portland and Pepperdine traded places in the conference rankings as a result of last weekend’s games and there are now no ties among the eight teams in the league. We take a look at who would play whom, based on current league standings.
Projected Seedings and Tournament Matchups Based on Present Standings:
1. Gonzaga (11-2)
2. St. Mary’s (9-3)
3. Santa Clara (7-5)
4. San Diego (6-6)
5. San Francisco (5-7)
6. Pepperdine (5-8)
7. Portland (4-9)
8. Loyola (3-10)
First Session Games, Friday, March 4th:
Game 1: #5 San Francisco v. #8 Loyola
Game
2: #6 Pepperdine v. #7 Portland
Second Session Games, Saturday, March 5th:
Game 3: #3 Santa Clara v. Pepperdine/Portland winner
Game 4: #4 San Diego v. San Francisco/Loyola winner
Semi-finals, Sunday, March 6th:
First Semi-final: #1 Gonzaga v. winner of San Diego v. San Francisco/Loyola winner
Second Semi-final: #2 St. Mary’s v. winner of Santa Clara v. Portland/Pepperdine winner
Note: Gonzaga will definitely play in the first semi-final game at 6:00 PM on Sunday, March 6th; the game will be shown on ESPN; the late semi-final game is scheduled to be shown on ESPN2.
Finals: Winner of Game 5 v. winner of Game 6, played on Monday night, March 7th at 9:00 PM, on ESPN.
At stake: the WCC tournament championship and resulting automatic NCAA bid.