San Diego (3-10, 2-7 WCC) • San Francisco (10-13, 4-8 WCC)
Thursday, March 4 • 6 p.m.
Orleans Arena (9,500) • Las Vegas, Nev.
TV/Stream •
Stadium |
Live Audio | Live Stats |
Tournament Central
SAN DIEGO—San Diego will open the 2020-21 UCU West Coast Conference Men's Basketball Tournament on Thursday at 6 p.m. PT against the No. 8 seed San Francisco.
The Toreros (3-10, 2-7 WCC) come into the conference tournament as the No. 9 seed, after the WCC teamed with Ken Pomeroy to develop a seeding model for the unique 2020-21 season. USD will face the Dons (10-13, 4-8 WCC) in the first round of the conference tournament after facing off one time earlier this season.
The game will air on Stadium and stream via the WCC Network. Live audio will be available on USDToreros.com with Jack Cronin on the call and live statistics will be available on USDToreros.com.
LAST TIME OUT
Yauhen Massalski scored a career-high 30 points, but San Diego fell to Pepperdine, 90-84, in the regular season finale in the Jenny Craig Pavilion.
Massalski added five rebounds and three assists to his 30-point game to lead USD.
Joey Calcaterra helped out with 17 points, four assists and three steals, while
Finn Sullivan chipped in with eight points, four assists and two steals.
USD took the early 15-8 lead before an 11-point run put the Waves on top. San Diego pulled within two at 27-25 with under five minutes remaining in that half. Massalski scored eight of USD's 10 points in the rally but the Waves responded again with a 12-0 run down the stretch and took a 41-29 lead into halftime.
Pepperdine kept the lead in double-digits for the majority of the second period. After trailing 88-77, San Diego went on a 7-0 run to shrink the deficit to 88-84 with 19 seconds to go in the contest. Pepperdine sank both free throws with 12 seconds left to ice the comeback, 90-84.
ALL-TIME SERIES WITH SAN FRANCISCO
Thursday will be the 86th between the Toreros and the Dons. USD trails the all-time series 41-44, and fell in the only other matchup this season, 70-62, at USF on Dec. 31, 2020.
The teams first met during the 1980-81 season. While San Diego has won four of the last six meetings, sweeping the series in 2018-19 and 2017-18, the Dons hold a two-game winning streak.
TOREROS IN THE WCC TOURNAMENT
The Toreros, who hold a 29-31 all-time record in the WCC Tournament, are two-time champions of the event (2003 and 2008) and have made a total of three finals appearances (other: 1994).
Last year, USD fell in the opening round
The tournament has been held in Las Vegas in 13 straight years, and the Toreros are 8-11 when the even has been held there.
As the lower seed, USD is 13-27 all-time in the tournament.
WCC ADOPTS NEW MODEL TO SEED UCU MEN'S BASKETBALL TOURNAMENT
With interruptions in the 2020-21 college basketball season due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the WCC will not fully complete its full conference schedules, leaving some disparity in the number of conference games completed among member programs.
The WCC partnered with Ken Pomeroy to develop a model that uses a proprietary algorithm that best reflects conference games completed and yields an adjusted conference winning percentage for each men's basketball team. The adjusted conference winning percentage accounts for the strength of the opponent and the location (home/away) of the game played. The offensive and defensive efficiency metric is not utilized in the algorithm to determine a team's adjusted conference winning percentage.
POSTSEASON HONORS
Calcaterra was named an All-WCC Honorable Mention after leading the Toreros in scoring, three-pointers and minutes per game.
The redshirt junior guard averaged 13.8 points per game on a 43.5 field-goal percentage, scoring double-digits in 10 of his 11 appearances. Calcaterra scored a career-high 23 points in USD's win over Santa Clara on Feb. 18 and hit 38.8 percent (19-of-49) from beyond the arc on the season.
Calcaterra's All-WCC honor is the fifth under head coach
Sam Scholl and the 60th first team, second team or honorable mention conference award in program history.
