For the second time in three years, the Arizona Wildcats are the Pac-12 tournament champions. On Saturday night, the 2015 champs beat the 2016 champion Oregon Ducks to complete an impressive tournament run.
In a top-heavy conference with three loaded teams at the top, Arizona earned the tournament title by outlasting that third Pac-12 super team, UCLA, followed by Saturday's win over the top-seeded Ducks.
Oregon took care of business on their end too, outlasting Cal to set up the title game.
The Pac-12 have three teams that are elite or close to it, another likely NCAA Tournament team after them, and maybe one more on the bubble. There’s real quality at the top, but the conference trails off quickly after its trio of top teams: Oregon, Arizona, and UCLA.
It would have been shocking if anyone beyond the league’s big three could win this tournament. Bubble teams in other conferences should hope nobody else does, because that would tie up an at-large bid for one of UCLA, Arizona, and Oregon. It’s a situation that probably won’t come up, based on how the season’s gone so far.
After the Bruins, Wildcats, and Ducks, the Pac-12 has USC as a likelier-than-not tournament team. The Trojans only lost eight games in the regular season, all in league play, and have great wins against UCLA and SMU.
Otherwise, the cupboard’s bare. Utah has a decent record but no standout wins and probably can’t make the field of 68 at-large without at least getting to the final. (Even that wouldn’t guarantee anything.) Cal might be able to get there with a deep run, but also has no guarantees. Everybody else isn’t getting into the tournament without winning the Pac-12 and an automatic bid, and that’s a tall order.
By adjusted efficiency, the Pac-12 was the worst of college basketball’s power conferences this year. More than one-fifth of all Pac-12 games this year have been decided by 20 points or more, a trend of blowouts that reflects the huge gap between the top of the conference and the bottom. Compared to other conferences, few games have been close at the end.
There’s been relatively little drama. If the final features some combination of Arizona, UCLA, and Oregon, we might see some. UCLA and Oregon played a thriller in December, and Arizona and UCLA played a tight one in February. There’s a good chance the first few days of this tournament are boring, but we could get power-on-power at the end.
The format
Every game takes place at the T-Mobile Center in Las Vegas. The top four seeds enjoy byes into the quarterfinals, while the bottom eight have first-round games for the right to join them there. It’s a single-elimination event, like all conference tournaments. The winner gets an automatic berth in the NCAA Tournament.
The teams
1. Oregon
2. Arizona
3. UCLA
4. Utah
5. California
6. USC
7. Colorado
8. Arizona State
9. Stanford
10. Washington State
11. Washington
12. Oregon State
The bracket
See the full bracket here or below (times Pacific):
Schedule and Results (all times Eastern)
Wednesday, March 8 (First Round)
Game 1: No. 8 Arizona State 98, No. 9 Stanford 88
Game 2: No. 5 Cal 67, No. 12 Oregon State 62
Game 3: No. 7 Colorado 73, No. 10 Washington State 63
Game 4: No. 6 USC 78, No. 11 Washington 73
Thursday, March 9 (Quarterfinals)
Game 5: No. 1 Oregon 80, No. 8 Arizona State 57
Game 6: No. 5 Cal 78, No. 4 Utah 75
Game 7: No. 2 Arizona 92, No. 7 Colorado 78
Game 8: No. 3 UCLA 76, No. 6 USC 74
Friday, March 10 (Semifinals)
Game 9: No. 1 Oregon 73, No. 5 Cal 65
Game 10: No. 2 Arizona 86, No. 3 UCLA 75
Saturday, March 11 (Championship)