West Coast conference tournament preview

This is part 11 of a 33-part series in this blog, designed to give you all the information you need to know about each conference's tournament, and the postseason prospects of every single team in the conference.

Final standings:
Gonzaga 17-1
BYU 13-5
St Mary's 13-5
Pepperdine 10-8
San Diego 8-10
Portland 7-11
Santa Clara 7-11
San Francisco 7-11
Pacific 4-14
Loyola Marymount 4-14

Conference tournament format:  Vegas!  Tournament runs Friday March 6 to Tuesday March 10, taking Sunday off because BYU sucks.  This is a straight-up tournament - no fancy double byes here.

Bracket:
1) Gonzaga vs. 8/9) San Francisco/Pacific
4) Pepperdine vs. 5) San Diego
2) BYU vs. 7/10) Santa Clara/Loyola Marymount
3) St Mary's vs. 6) Portland

The stakes:
Just based on a straight-up comparison with other contenders for the 1 line, Gonzaga just isn't going to get there.  Last year, this resume could be the 3rd overall 1 seed.  This year, there's more contenders for the top line.  The issue is having Arizona own that trump card...Villanova also only has 2 losses and ran through the Big East...Wisconsin lost only 3 games...there's just too many good contenders.

Gonzaga vs. Villanova - Nova has twice the number of top 50 wins, the same number of losses, and while the non-con SoS is worse (14 vs. 63), it's not enough to close the gap
Gonzaga vs. Wisconsin - UW has just a couple more top 50 wins, but has a greater depth of wins, and actually a better non-con SoS (13)

I won't go on, but you get the idea.  The two big things Gonzaga brought to the table (lack of losses and signature non-con SoS) can be matched, or at least approached, by all the other contenders.

BYU/St Mary's should be a semifinal.  Win that at...you're at the mercy of the bubble, frankly.  It'll depend what happens elsewhere.  Lose that, and you're in trouble.  It's really a simple set of circumstances for BYU.

St Mary's should be a NIT lock.  They're too far gone in the bubble race to matter, even if they beat BYU.  Pepperdine is a CBI/CIT lock.  Portland is CIT eligible, and San Diego needs to beat Pepperdine to do the same.