1987 West Coast Athletic Conference men's basketball tournament


The 1987 West Coast Athletic Conference men's basketball tournament (now West Coast Conference) was held from February 28 to March 7, with the semifinals and finals at the War Memorial Gymnasium at the University of San Francisco in San Francisco, California.[1] This was the first edition of the conference tournament and included all eight teams.

1987 West Coast Athletic Conference men's basketball tournament
ClassificationDivision I
Season1986–87
Teams8
SiteWar Memorial Gymnasium
San Francisco, CA
ChampionsSanta Clara (1st title)
Winning coachCarroll Williams (1st title)
MVPJens Gordon (Santa Clara)
West Coast Athletic Conference men's basketball tournaments
1988 →
1986–87 West Coast Athletic Conference men's basketball standings
Conf Overall
Team W   L   PCT W   L   PCT
San Diego 13 1   .929 24 6   .800
Gonzaga 9 5   .643 18 10   .643
Saint Mary's 7 7   .500 17 13   .567
Portland 6 8   .429 14 14   .500
Santa Clara 6 8   .429 18 14   .563
San Francisco 6 8   .429 16 12   .571
Pepperdine 5 9   .357 12 18   .400
Loyola Marymount 4 10   .286 12 16   .429
Conference tournament winner
Rankings from AP poll

The first round quarterfinals were held on the home courts of the top four seeds, and two of the hosts were defeated.[2][3] In the semifinals on a neutral court in San Francisco, the lower seeds won both semifinals;[4] both had losing conference records.

Fifth-seeded Santa Clara defeated #7 Pepperdine in the championship game 77–65 to gain the automatic bid to the 64-team NCAA tournament,[5] and were seeded fifteenth in the West regional. Regular season champion San Diego, upset by a point in the conference semifinals,[4] received an at-large bid and were the ninth seed in the Midwest regional; both WCAC teams lost in the first round.

Bracket

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Quarterfinals
Saturday, February 28
Sunday, March 1
(four sites)
Semifinals
Friday, March 6
San Francisco
Championship
Saturday, March 7
San Francisco
         
1 San Diego * 99
8 Loyola Marymount 84
1 San Diego 63
7 Pepperdine 64
5 Santa Clara 91
4 Portland * 60
7 Pepperdine 65
(Pairings are reseeded after the first round)
5 Santa Clara 77
3 Saint Mary's * 62
6 San Francisco 57
3 Saint Mary's 50
5 Santa Clara 55
7 Pepperdine 76
2 Gonzaga * 73
* denotes host team

References

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  1. ^ "1986-87 West Coast Conference Season Summary". sports-reference.com. Sports Reference LLC. 2016. Archived from the original on March 8, 2016. Retrieved March 19, 2016.
  2. ^ Blanchette, John (March 1, 1987). "GU postseason a post-mortem". Spokesman-Review. (Spokane, Washington). p. D1.
  3. ^ "UP Pilots blown out in playoff". Eugene Register-Guard. (Oregon). Associated Press. March 2, 1987. p. 5C.
  4. ^ a b "Pepperdine shocks USD in tourney". Spokesman-Review. (Spokane, Washington). Associated Press. March 7, 1987. p. B2.
  5. ^ "Santa Clara wins berth in tourney". Spokesman-Review. (Spokane, Washington). Associated Press. March 8, 1987. p. D5.