2020 West Coast Conference Men's Basketball Tournament

The 2020 West Coast Conference Men's Basketball Tournament was the postseason men's basketball tournament for the West Coast Conference during the 2019–20 NCAA Division I men's basketball season. The tournament was held from March 5 through March 10, 2020 at the Orleans Arena in Paradise, Nevada.[1] Gonzaga, the winner of the tournament, received the conference's automatic bid to the 2020 NCAA Tournament.[2] For the second consecutive year, the Los Angeles-based University Credit Union is the title sponsor of the tournament.[3]

2020 West Coast Conference Men's Basketball Tournament
Classification	Division I
Season	2019–20
Teams	10
Site	Orleans Arena Paradise, Nevada
Champions	Gonzaga (18th title)
Winning coach	Mark Few (16th title)
MVP	Joël Ayayi (Gonzaga)
Television	ESPN, ESPN2, BYUtv
West Coast Conference Men's Basketball Tournaments

2019–20 West Coast Conference men's basketball standings
	Conf							Overall
Team	W		L		PCT			W		L		PCT
No. 2 Gonzaga †	15	–	1		.938			31	–	2		.939
No. 14 BYU	13	–	3		.813			24	–	8		.750
Saint Mary's	11	–	5		.688			26	–	8		.765
Pacific	11	–	5		.688			23	–	10		.697
San Francisco	9	–	7		.563			22	–	12		.647
Pepperdine	8	–	8		.500			16	–	16		.500
Santa Clara	6	–	10		.375			20	–	13		.606
Loyola Marymount	4	–	12		.250			11	–	21		.344
San Diego	2	–	14		.125			9	–	23		.281
Portland	1	–	15		.063			9	–	23		.281
† 2020 WCC Tournament winner As of February 6, 2021; Rankings from AP Poll

Venue

For the twelfth consecutive year, the 2020 WCC Tournament was held in the Orleans Arena. When the Orleans Arena is setup for basketball games, the seating capacity is 7,471.[4] The tournament is scheduled to be held at the Orleans Arena at least until 2022.[5] The Orleans Arena is located at the 1,886 room Orleans Hotel and Casino about 1 mile west of the Las Vegas Strip.[6] Tickets sold out for the 2020 WCC Tournament within one hour of the time they were made available to the public.[7] Tickets have sold out for the WCC Tournament for 11 years in a row.[7]

Seeds

All 10 WCC schools participated in the tournament. Teams were seeded by conference record, with a tiebreaker system used to seed teams with identical conference records.[8] The tournament returned to a format similar to that used from 2003 to 2011, with slight changes to the terminology used for the rounds prior to the semifinals. The 7 through 10 seeds played in the "first round", the 5 and 6 seeds started play in the "second round", and the 3 and 4 seeds started in the "third round". The top two seeds received byes into the semifinals.[9]

Seed	School	Record	Tiebreaker 1	Tiebreaker 2
1	Gonzaga	15–1
2	BYU	13–3
3	Saint Mary's	11–5	1–1 vs. Pacific	2–0 vs. USF[10]
4	Pacific	11–5	1–1 vs. Saint Mary's	1–1 vs. USF
5	San Francisco	9–7
6	Pepperdine	8–8
7	Santa Clara	6–10
8	Loyola Marymount	4–12
9	San Diego	2–14
10	Portland	1–15

Orleans Arena, location of 2020 WCC Tournament

Schedule

Session	Game	Time*	Matchup^#	Score	Television	Attendance
First round – Thursday March 5, 2020
1	1	6:00 pm	No. 8 Loyola Marymount vs. No. 9 San Diego	75–61	BYUtv	1,983
	2	8:00 pm	No. 7 Santa Clara vs. No. 10 Portland	76–62
Second round – Friday March 6, 2020
2	3	6:00 pm	No. 5 San Francisco vs. No. 8 Loyola Marymount	82–53	BYUtv	3,850
	4	8:00 pm	No. 6 Pepperdine vs. No. 7 Santa Clara	84–73
Third round – Saturday, March 7, 2020
3	5	7:00 pm	No. 4 Pacific vs. No. 5 San Francisco	54–72	ESPN2	4,350
	6	9:00 pm	No. 3 Saint Mary's vs. No. 6 Pepperdine	89–82
Semifinals – Monday, March 9, 2020
4	7	6:00 pm	No. 1 Gonzaga vs. No. 5 San Francisco	81–77	ESPN	7,471
	8	8:30 pm	No. 2 BYU vs. No. 3 Saint Mary's	50–51	ESPN2
Championship – Tuesday, March 10, 2020
5	9	6:00 pm	No. 1 Gonzaga vs. No. 3 Saint Mary's	84–66	ESPN	7,210
*Game times in PT. #-Rankings denote tournament seeding.

Bracket

	First round Thursday, March 5 BYUtv					Second round Friday, March 6 BYUtv					Third round Saturday, March 7 ESPN2					Semifinals Monday, March 9 ESPN & ESPN2					Championship Tuesday, March 10 ESPN
	8	Loyola Marymount	75
	9	San Diego	61			8	Loyola Marymount	53
						5	San Francisco	82
											5	San Francisco	72
											4	Pacific	54
																5	San Francisco	77
																1	Gonzaga	81
																					1	Gonzaga	84
																					3	Saint Mary's	66
																2	BYU	50
																3	Saint Mary's	51
											3	Saint Mary's	89**
											6	Pepperdine	82
						6	Pepperdine	84
	7	Santa Clara	76			7	Santa Clara	73
	10	Portland	62

References

1. "West Coast Conference Official Athletic Site". wccsports.com. Retrieved 2020-01-30.
2. "Exploring the absurd odds of a perfect bracket | NCAA.com". www.ncaa.com. Retrieved 2020-01-30.
3. "West Coast Conference Partners with University Credit Union as Title Sponsor of Basketball Championships". wccsports.com. Retrieved 2020-02-28.
4. "Orleans Arena, Las Vegas Event Production | OrleansArena.com". 2008-01-22. Archived from the original on 2008-01-22. Retrieved 2020-02-28.
5. "West Coast Conference agrees to three-year extension to hold tournaments at Orleans Arena | The Spokesman-Review". www.spokesman.com. Retrieved 2020-01-30.
6. Hawks, John; Higgins, Tom (2009-02-03). The Complete Idiot's Guide to Las Vegas: The Savvy Vacationer’s Guide to All Things Las Vegas. Penguin. ISBN 978-1-4406-8515-6.
7. "UCU WCC Basketball Tournament Sold Out". wccsports.com. Retrieved 2020-02-28.
8. "Explaining Tiebreakers for the West Coast Conference standings". CougarSportsInsider.com. Retrieved 2020-01-30.
9. "WCC approves significant changes to scheduling, tournament format | The Spokesman-Review". www.spokesman.com. Retrieved 2020-01-30.
10. "Brackets, Game Times Announced for 2020 WCC Basketball Tournament". wccsports.com. Retrieved 2020-04-07.