3 Initial Takeaways From WCC Conference Schedule
By Josh Horton
The WCC released its schedule for conference play this morning, with many marquee matcups and intriguing contests scattered around the schedule.
The WCC season, which will tip-off on December 27 and conclude on February 28, uses a double round-robin style scheduling format to decide the league champion. Teams will travel with their respective travel partner’s: Gonzaga-Portland, Saint Mary’s-Pacific, Santa Clara-San Francisco, Loyola Marymount-Pepperdine and Brigham Young-San Diego.
Check out the full schedule here.
Last season, the conference took a lot of flak for its scheduling methods, especially from Gonzaga and Portland, who played multiple home games when their students were away for Winter Break. This season, it appears the WCC has learned from their mistakes and put together a much more balanced schedule this time around.
After briefly glancing at it, here are some initial reactions:
The Big Winner: Gonzaga
After last season’s scheduling fiasco when the Bulldogs played four home games when its students were off for Winter Break and then played four road games when they came back, Gonzaga is lucky this time around.
The Zags play Saint Mary’s and BYU with their full crop of students in town, and BYU on the road December 27, when their student section is out of town on break.
The Big Losers: Pepperdine and LMU
Pepperdine and LMU both have four straight road games smack-dab in the middle of their schedule, the longest stretch of home or road games for any team in the conference.
The Lions and Waves take on a combination of Santa Clara, San Francisco, Pacific and Saint Mary’s in a span of four games.
Evened Out
This season, the schedule is much more evened and spaced out. There will be no situation like last season, where BYU played Pepperdine twice in 11 days.
Each team will play all nine of the other teams in one half of the schedule, and again in the other half.
Although the WCC has been the subject of a lot of criticism scheduling wise recently, the conference officials have learned from their mistakes and have put together a quality conference schedule. And for that, the WCC deserves a lot of credit.