[M T]

Maybe Pacific got the nod both on the at-large bid and the 2-seed because they are hosting.

Giving one advantage to a team isn't enough?  (Yes, the tournament has to be hosted somewhere, and the host team does wind up with advantages, if they're playing. But also bumping them up in seeding seems too much!)

One of Pacific (16-5), Pepperdine(24-7), or UCDavis (16-7) is guaranteed to get to the finals.  UCLA (17-5) is guaranteed not to.

During the MPSF championship game, criteria for choosing at-large teams was shown.  One of them was how they had done in the last 10 games.

Pacific is 6-4 in its last 10, with loses to Stanford, UCLA, LBSU, UCSB (but does have a win over USC).  It lost BOTH of its last 2 games in its conference tournament.   How such a team is seeded #2 is beyond me.

Quite possibly, each of the two semi-finals will be intra-conference games (MPSF: Stanford-USC; GCC: Pacific-Pepperdine), rather than setting them up as inter-conference games.   Kinda makes you wonder why there are conference tournaments if the committee is going to set it up this way. ("Yeah, we know you had a tournament, but we're going to make it almost meaningless as we're going to make you play yet another game against a conference opponent")

Clearly there is a lot more parity in water polo this year than there has ever been before.  Water polo is very strong in some other parts of the world.  A few scholarships can quickly improve a team.

P.S.  The NCAA has hit UCSB's water polo and track teams with level II violations.  For the WP team's competition, the penalties are in the past (including vacating records, which may not yet be adjusted).  There are recruiting restrictions in the future plus a fine.  For the WP head coach (Wolf Wigo, Stanford BA '96) and an assistant coach, and the Track & Field head coach(es), there are future restrictions.

[M T]

Maybe Pacific got the nod both on the at-large bid and the 2-seed because they are hosting.

Giving one advantage to a team isn't enough?  (Yes, the tournament has to be hosted somewhere, and the host team does wind up with advantages, if they're playing. But also bumping them up in seeding seems too much!)

One of Pacific (16-5), Pepperdine(24-7), or UCDavis (16-7) is guaranteed to get to the finals.  UCLA (17-5) is guaranteed not to.

During the MPSF championship game, criteria for choosing at-large teams was shown.  One of them was how they had done in the last 10 games.

Pacific is 6-4 in its last 10, with loses to Stanford, UCLA, LBSU, UCSB (but does have a win over USC).  It lost BOTH of its last 2 games in its conference tournament.   How such a team is seeded #2 is beyond me.

Quite possibly, each of the two semi-finals will be intra-conference games (MPSF: Stanford-USC; GCC: Pacific-Pepperdine), rather than setting them up as inter-conference games.   Kinda makes you wonder why there are conference tournaments if the committee is going to set it up this way. ("Yeah, we know you had a tournament, but we're going to make it almost meaningless as we're going to make you play yet another game against a conference opponent")

Clearly there is a lot more parity in water polo this year than there has ever been before.  Water polo is very strong in some other parts of the world.  A few scholarships can quickly improve a team.

P.S.  The NCAA has hit UCSB's water polo and track teams with level II violations.  For the WP team's competition, the penalties are in the past (including vacating records, which may not yet be adjusted).  There are recruiting restrictions in the future plus a fine.  For the WP head coach (Wolf Wigo, Stanford BA '96) and an assistant coach, and the Track & Field head coach(es), there are future restrictions.