Conference to resume holding its tournament for NCAA berth

By Greg Schain
Daily Bruin Reporter

In a controversial move, the Pac-10 CEO Group/Council elected in
2000 to reinstate the conference tournament for the 2001-02 season
to determine which team receives the conference’s automatic
berth into the NCAA Tournament.

The tournament, which will take place Thursday, March 7, through
Saturday, March 9, at the Staples Center, will be the
Pac-10’s first conference tournament since 1990. Until this
season, the Pac-10 has been the only major conference in the
country not to have a conference tournament to decide who gets the
conference’s automatic berth into the NCAA Tournament.

Arizona head coach Lute Olson and Stanford head coach Mike
Montgomery have both spoken out against the tournament. They say
the Pac-10’s past success in the NCAA Tournament is
attributable to the lack of a conference tournament, because its
teams are refreshed while other conferences’ representatives
are still recovering from the grueling competition of
intraconference play. They also hate the idea of the extra
traveling and the fact that students are missing extra classes in
March.

“I hate the idea of a conference tournament,” Olson
said. “The kids are already missing several weeks of classes
because of the NCAA Tournament. They shouldn’t have to miss
an extra week of because of the conference one.”

However, others argue a tournament is healthy for the conference
because it will create more excitement in the regular season. The
Pac-10 will only take the top eight regular season finishers into
the draw, so teams having bad seasons will still have a reason to
practice and play hard despite being out of the race for the
conference championship.

“There’ll certainly be some action towards the end
of the season in the bottom half of the conference,” said Jim
Muldoon, assistant commissioner of the Pac-10. “Teams are
gonna be fighting to get in the tournament.”

It is unclear whether having a conference tournament will help
or hurt the number of Pac-10 teams that get selected for the NCAA
tournament. If teams that are on the cusp of getting selected get
knocked out in the first round of the conference tourney, the
selection committee would certainly take notice.

However, if a seventh or eighth seed makes a surprising run in
the conference tournament, it might propel them to a NCAA berth
even if they lose in the finals to a top seed.

“If anything, the conference tournament will help the
number of teams selected to the NCAA Tournament from the
Pac-10,” Muldoon said. “It might help them get a couple
of extra wins.”

UCLA won’t be affected greatly by the reintroduction of
the tournament. The Bruins normally have a schedule of Pac-10 games
the week before the NCAA Tournament anyway, and since it will be at
the Staples Center, they won’t have to travel.

In fact, UCLA head coach Steve Lavin is looking forward to the
tournament.

“The tournament will give us national media exposure that
will help our visibility and with recruiting,” he said.
“It’ll be three days of great basketball.”

Lavin speculates that UCLA might have a slight edge in the
tournament, because of the home crowd.

“We’d like to believe that playing close to our
campus and in front of Southern California sports fans will be a
positive,” he said.

Tickets for the tournament have already sold out, although more
might become available in the future.

The Pac-10 previously had a conference tournament from
1987-1990. UCLA captured the first tournament title, and Arizona
captured the final three.

The Staples Center has signed on to host the tournament through
2007. The quarterfinal and semifinal rounds will be on Fox Sports
Net, with the finals airing on CBS.