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Some Thoughts About The Big West Conference
Men's Tournament Bracket--(Mar. 2, 2003)

bigwestlogotourney_03.jpg (11791 bytes)The Big West Conference is scheduled to start next week, March 12 at the Anaheim Convention Center, and unlike the WCC Tournament which gets underway this week, the regular conference season doesn't end for the Big West until next Saturday, March 8, so there's still plenty of basketball left to be played before the seeds are decided. 

We decided to take a look at the bracket if it were seeded today, based on the standings as of the finish of yesterday's games and frankly, while there might be some movement among the No. 6, 7 and 8 seeds, we don't expect it to look much different than what we've got below, no matter what happens in the next week....Of course, if USCB loses both remaining games, it could look a lot different, but we don't expect that to happen. 

Here's what the bracket would look like if it were seeded today:

Mens' Big West Conference Tournament Bracket
Anaheim Convention Center
March 13-15,  2003

 

 

First Round
Quarterfinals
Thurs. March 13
Second Round
Semifinals
Friday March 14
Championship Final
Saturday March 15
9:00 p.m. PST (ESPN)

Seed No. 1
[UCSB]
Game 5
12:00 p.m.PST


[CSUN, UOP or CSUF]
Seed No. 8

Winner Game 5

Game 11
6:00 p.m. PST

Winner Game 6

Winner Game 11

 

 

Game 14

 

 

Winner Game 12

Seed No. 4
[Cal Poly]

Game 6
30 min after Gm 5


[Idaho]
Seed No. 5
Seed No. 3
[Utah State]

Game 7
6:00 p.m. PST


[CSUN, UOP or CSUF]
Seed No. 6
Winner Game 7

Game 12
30 min after Game 11

Winner Game 8

Seed No. 7
[CSUN, UOP or CSUF]

Game 8
30 min after Gm 7


[UC Irvine]
Seed No. 2

So who is likely to be positioned in which seed spot by the end of the conference a week from Saturday?   Here are the standings as of yesterday's games (note, you can get each team's full schedule by clicking on the links):

  2002-2003 STANDINGS
(through games of Mar. 1, 2003)

 

  Conference Overall
  W L Pct. W L Pct.
*UC Santa Barbara 12 4 .750 15 12 .556
*UC Irvine 12 5 .706 18 8 .692
*Utah State 10 6 .625 19 8 .704
*Cal Poly 9 7 .563 13 12 .520
*Idaho 8 8 .500 12 13 .480
*Cal State Northridge 7 9 .438 13 13 .500
*Pacific 7 9 .438 12 13 .480
*Cal State Fullerton 7 9 .438 9 17 .346
UC Riverside 5 11 .313 6 16 .273
Long Beach State 4 13 .235 5 21 .192

Unless something drastic occurs, look for Santa Barbara to get the No. 1 seed. With two games remaining, against Fullerton and UC Riverside, the Gauchos should take them both and pull into sole possession of first place. Irvine will likely finish in the No. 2 spot, with one game remaining against Long Beach State, the Anteaters should win as well.

The No. 3 seed should belong to Utah State if they can win both of their remaining games against CSUN and Pacific, both at home.    The Aggies beat CSUN at Northridge, but lost to Pacific earlier in conference play.  Cal Poly has Riverside and Fullerton left on the schedule, both games we expect the Mustangs to win, so we expect them to keep the No. 4 seed.  Idaho has Pacific and CSUN, and while they could drop one of those games, it's not going to affect the top seeds at all, nor the bottom three teams very much except as between the No. 6, 7 and 8 seeds.   We expect those three, CSUN, Pacific and Fullerton to all make the tournament and be seeded somewhere among the last three.  Riverside is not yet tournament eligible, and finally Long Beach State won't make it this year and will rebuild for next season.

That's it for now....check back in a week to see what it's really going to look like.


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