LA JOLLA, Calif. – The Western Water Polo Association (WWPA) announced the seeding for its upcoming conference tournament Monday and 12th-ranked UC San Diego will go in as the No. 2 seed.
The WWPA Championship is slated for November 19-21 at Schaal Aquatics Center on the campus of UC Davis. The winner of the tournament will earn an automatic berth in the National Collegiate Men's Water Polo Championship in early December.
UC San Diego will begin its postseason against seventh-seeded Concordia. The first round match-up is set for Friday, November 19 at 9:30 a.m. The Tritons defeated the Eagles, 19-4, earlier this season.
Here are the seeds for the nine-team tournament.
1. UC Davis (7-1)
2. UC San Diego (6-2)
3. California Baptist (6-2)
4. Loyola Marymount (6-2)
5. Air Force (5-3)
6. Santa Clara (2-6)
7. Concordia (2-6)
8. Fresno Pacific (2-6)
9. Biola (0-8)
Five of seven matches this past week came down to one goal and seeds were not determined until a sudden-victory goal from Concordia trickled in on Saturday evening. In addition, seeds No.'s 2-4 and No.'s 6-8 were decided by the conference's tie-breaking procedure.
Below are all five match-ups for the first round of this season's tourney. The winner of the Biola/Fresno Pacific match must play twice on opening day as it will face top-seeded UC Davis in the last game of the day.
Friday, November 19 - First Round
Game 1 (8am): #9 Biola vs #8 Fresno Pacific
Game 2 (9:30am): #7 Concordia vs #2 UC San Diego
Game 3 (11am): #6 Santa Clara vs #3 California Baptist
Game 4 (12:30pm): #5 Air Force vs #4 Loyola Marymount
Game 5 (2pm): Winner Game 1 vs #1 UC Davis
The Tritons last won a WWPA title in 2018, defeating Fresno Pacific (11-4), Air Force (15-3), and UC Davis (11-10) to earn the league's automatic berth in the national championship tournament.
UC San Diego closed out its regular season on Saturday, November 6 with an 11-10 victory over UC Davis on the road.
------
About UC San Diego Athletics
After two decades as one of the most successful programs in NCAA Division II, the UC San Diego intercollegiate athletics program began a new era in 2020 as a member of the Big West Conference in NCAA Division I. The 23-sport Tritons earned 30 team and nearly 150 individual national championships during its time in Divisions II and III and helped guide 1,400 scholar-athletes to All-America honors. A total of 84 Tritons have earned Academic All-America honors, while 38 have earned prestigious NCAA Post Graduate Scholarships. UC San Diego scholar-athletes exemplify the academic ideals of one of the world's preeminent institutions, graduating at an average rate of 91 percent, one of the highest rates among institutions at all divisions.
