2025 WCC Tournament Thread

The WCC Tourney is upon us!

Tomorrow (Thursday 3/6) we have the #10 Pacific Tigers (4-14, 9-23) vs. the #11 USD Toreros (2-16, 5-26).

I propose a game that will sidestep any Bronco bias. Let’s all make a prediction of winners in the first three rounds of the tourney. 20 points for each game you get correctly. 10 points for picking the correct score differential (dock 1 point for each point difference). 10 points for getting the correct combined total score (dock 1 point for each point difference).

For example: you pick USD to win by 10 with a total game score of 150 (ergo 80-70 final score). USD beats Pacific by 5 with a final combined score of 147 (76-71). You’d earn 20 for picking the correct winner; you’d earn 5 points on the margin of victory; and you’d earn 7 points on the final combined score. If you pick the wrong team, you get zero for the pick and zero for the margin of victory, but you still earn points on the total combined score.

I’ll start:

First Round: Pacific beats USD 80-70
Second Round Game 1: Portland beats Pepperdine 78-69
Second Round Game 2: LMU beats Pacific 72-59
Third Round Game 1: OSU beats Portland 81-73
Third Round Game 2: LMU beats WSU 71-67

The winner earns the unqualified admiration of the members on this board.

EDIT TO ADD: the lowest points earned is ZERO (no negative points). All picks must be posted to this board by 2:25PM Pacific Standard Time today. (five minutes before Round 1 game tipoff).

5 Likes

I’m in….

1st Round: USD beats Pacific 73-70
2nd Round Gm 1: Portland beats Pepp. 76-71
2nd Round Gm 2: LMU beats USD 70-61
3rd Round Gm 1: OSU beats Portland 80-67
3rd Round Gm 2: WSU beats LMU 76-70

2 Likes

Heres my stab -

1st round - UOP over USD. 74-68
2nd round - Portland over Pepp 82-71
2nd round - LMU over UOP 71 - 68
3rd round - OSU over Portland 84- 80 (hope I’m wrong)
3rd round - WSU over LMU 79- 71

Add on question - will you be in Vegas? I’ll be there!

1 Like

Great idea!

  • Round 1: UOP over USD 78-71
    The USD AD says that Lavin will be returning next year and that they have invested more into NIL and a practice facility. We will see if results follow. But I don’t see the Toreros getting another win.

  • Round 2: Pepperdine over Portland 84-80 and LMU over UOP 68-57
    The Pilots seemed kind of hapless against USD, and Shantay may be looking for a spot on the bench of a power conference squad. I’m not sure there’s much motivation left in them. Meanwhile, Todorovic can go for like 40 pts some nights if he gets a mind to. And LMU is too good to drop a game to UOP, but I think LMU’s defense will keep it messy and low-scoring.

  • Round 3: Pepperdine over OSU 74-67 and LMU over WSU 69-66
    Two upsets over the once and future Pac-12 members?! The Beavers are awwwwwful in true away games and merely much worse in neutral site games. Gil Coliseum apparently has some voodoo that washes away when the Beavs step outside the city limits of Corvallis. So I think a hot Pepperdine team may just get the better of them. Similarly, LMU’s trick is to muck it up against a Wazzu squad that wants to get lots of offense. I think the Lions get the upset and leave these Cougars longing to get out of a league that they’re “too good for” much like the last set of Cougars on loan to the WCC.

@G-man I promised myself that if SCU beat GU two weeks ago, I would go to Vegas this year for the first time. Alas, it was not to be. Though I may get tempted to do something foolish if they make the championship game…

I made a spreadsheet, please check my work:

2 Likes

Very cool, @buckets

Well done.

1 Like

Here’s my prediction:

1st Round: UOP beats USD 78-72

2nd Round: Portland beats Pepperdine 82-74
LMU beats UOP: 73-65

3rd Round: OSU beats Portland 87-69
LMU beats WSU 75-70

1 Like

To clarify: the lowest points earned in any point category is ZERO (no negative points).

All picks must be posted to this board by 2:25PM Pacific Standard Time today. (five minutes before Round 1 game tipoff). Picks are locked after this time, no changes can be made to future rounds/games.

This message board is the plan of record. You can edit your picks up until 2:25PM PST (according to the board’s time, not your watch :rofl:). If you submit an edit, your previous slate of picks are null and void. (obviously)

Gotcha, Dooger.

I’ll post the full board after tipoff.

1 Like

Pacific over usd 65-62

Pepp over port 82-61
Lmu over pac 77-60

Oregon st over Pepp 59-57
Lmu over wash st 81-79

1 Like

Final Entries - let me know if I made a mistake.

This is some UGLY basketball. Eleven total turnovers in 8 minutes.

Seven minutes remaining in the game.

33 combined turnovers. 16 for USD, 17 for UoP.

:man_facepalming:

1 Like

Brackets are busted early!

92bronc was the only person to pick USD, he hurtles out to a commanding lead with 29 points.

The rest of the field is tightly packed:

Dooger and I are tied for second with 2 points

PattyMac scored 1 point

Midwestbronco14 and G-man with 0

Patty and Midwest can get back into it with a Pepp win tomorrow. We all went chalk in the 2nd game with LMU, so very little movement in the standings can happen with that game.

I think ESPN owes me some cheddar for getting 6 extra people to actually care about this first game.

4 Likes

Probably not much cheddar, buckets. I cared so much that I forget to even check the score until there was only 2:40 to go in the game.

1 Like

Both Portland and Pepp are effectively mixing in zone defense with M2M.

1 Like

I picked the total opposite in the WCC “betting” pool that @bettingman puts on. Took Portland and the under there. That fake bet is looking much better than my bet on this board. :face_with_tears_of_joy:

Shantay is a good motivator. I should have remembered and accounted for that.

I still kinda think that OSU gets upset. But not looking like the Waves who are gonna do it.

Portland let this one slip away. They were up 54-40 with 12 min left in the game.

Pepp then outscored Portland 41-17, with one minute left in the game.

2 Likes

What a collapse by the Pilots. I jinxed 'em.

Speaking of jinxes…this is one of the stranger announcements from a WCC team in quite some time:

No details except that Williams may be done.

2 Likes

Wow…just…wow. That is a big deal.

3 Likes