Brackets, Game Times Announced for 2016 West Coast Conference Basketball Championships

2016 WCC Women's Basketball Champioship bracket

TOURNAMENT CENTRAL

SAN BRUNO, Calif.—The West Coast Conference has announced the brackets and game times for the 2016 WCC Basketball Championships at the Orleans Arena in Las Vegas.

BYU (24-5, 16-2) enters this year’s tournament as the defending champions and is the No. 1 seed after capturing its first WCC regular season crown.

The tournament will begin with a women's opening round match-up at 12:00 p.m. PST on Thursday, March 3 and continue through to the championship game on Tuesday, March 8. All games will be televised live nationwide, and all will be streamed on-line.

Thursday, March 3 features a full day of women's basketball action. Seeds 7-10 will play in the tournament's two opening round games followed by the first two of four women's quarterfinals.

Friday, March 4 opens with two women's quarterfinals. There will be no games on Sunday, March 6, and the tournament resumes with the semifinals on Monday, March 7. The women’s champion will be crowned on Tuesday, March 8.

BYU posted a 16-2 conference mark, capturing its first WCC regular season crown. With a 14-4 WCC record, Saint Mary’s finished in second place. San Diego and Santa Clara tied at 13-5 with the Toreros taking the third seed via a tiebreaking win over BYU.

Gonzaga is the fifth seed at 10-8, while San Francisco is the sixth seed at 9-9. San Diego plays San Francisco and Santa Clara takes on Gonzaga in Friday's quarterfinals.

Loyola Marymount (seven), Pacific (eight), Pepperdine (nine) and Portland (10) round out the women's bracket, and will start tournament play on Thursday afternoon in the opening round.

For the third straight year, every game from the 2016 West Coast Conference Championships will be nationally televised. All of the women's games, except for the championship game, can be seen live in well over 60 million homes nationwide via cable and satellite on BYUtv. Those games will also be streamed live on TheW.tv, the West Coast Conference's digital platform.

On Tuesday, the championship game will be shown nationwide at 1 p.m. on ESPNU/WatchESPN.

The winner of the 2016 West Coast Conference Basketball Championships will receive an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.

Thursday, March 3

No. 8 Pacific vs. No. 9 Pepperdine, 12:00 p.m. (BYUtv, TheW.tv)

No. 7 Loyola Marymount vs. No. 10 Portland, 2:00 p.m. (BYUtv, TheW.tv)

No. 3 San Diego vs. No. 6 San Francisco, 6:00 p.m. (BYUtv, TheW.tv)

No. 4 Santa Clara vs. No. 5 Gonzaga, 8:00 p.m. (BYUtv, TheW.tv)

Friday, March 4

No. 1 BYU vs. No. 8/9, 12:00 p.m. (BYUtv, TheW.tv)
No. 2 Saint Mary’s vs. No. 7/10, 2:00 p.m. (BYUtv, TheW.tv)

Monday, March 7

Women's Semifinal No. 1, 12:00 p.m. (BYUtv, TheW.tv)

Women's Semifinal No. 2, 2:00 p.m. (BYUtv, TheW.tv)

Tuesday, March 8

Women's Championship Game, 1:00 p.m. (ESPNU, WatchESPN)