UPDATE: ryebreadraz beat me to this in a comment in his fanpost from earlier this week.

I haven't seen this anywhere else yet, and correct me if I'm wrong, but the Bruins get the #1 seed in the Pac-10 Tourney with a win and a Washington loss no matter what now. Nothing else matters anymore, not even the Cal-Arizona State game.

Here's why:

Scenario #1: Cal beats ASU

This would put UCLA and Washington tied for first at 13-5, with the first tiebreaker being head-to-head, where the teams split. The next tiebreaker would be results against the next best team, which in this case would be Cal, finishing third. UCLA swept Cal, Cal swept Washington, so UCLA would get the #1 seed

Scenario #2: Arizona State beats Cal

In this scenario, UCLA and UW would be tied at 13-5 and would still be tied in the first tiebreaker, head-to-head. Cal and Arizona State would be tied for third at 11-7 and under Pac-10 rules, you take head-to-head results against tied teams as a group, and UCLA and Washington both went 2-2 against these schools. So the next tiebreakers would be head-to-head results against the next best team. Both UCLA and Washington would've split against Washington State, split against Arizona, swept USC, swept Oregon State, swept Stanford and swept Oregon.

Here's the Pac-10 tiebreaker rules from their media guide (PDF):

1. Two-team tie
a. Results of head-to-head competition during the regular season.

b. Each team’s record vs. the team occupying the highest position in the final regular standings, and then continuing down through the standings until one team gains an advantage.

When arriving at another group of tied teams while comparing records, use each team’s record against the collective tied teams as a group (prior to that group’s own tie-breaking procedure), rather than the performance against individual tied teams.

c. Won-lost percentage against all Division I opponents.
d. Coin toss conducted by the Commissioner or designee.

a) and b) would be even as I established already. For the whole season, UCLA would be 24-7 and Washington would be 23-8, so UCLA would get the #1 seed by tiebreaker c).

And to think, had Washington won one more non-conference game (or UCLA lost one more) -- this could've gone to a coin toss.

(Cross-posted from my blog.)

***9:03 PM UPDATE: With the Angels win, the magic number is now 1.

The Angels can clinch home-field advantage in the first round tonight with a win and a White Sox loss.

My reasoning:

The Angels are 93-59, the White Sox are 84-68. If the Angels finish ahead of the White Sox, the worst they can possibly do is be the #2 seed in the AL, because:

* The Halos would have a better record than any AL Central team
* If the wild card comes out of the East, the Angels would play the wild card team, and the wild card team never gets home-field advantage.
* If the wild card came out of the Central, even if the Angels had a worse record than the AL East winner, the Angels would still have a better record than the Central winner, meaning the Angels would have home-field in the first round.

Game 1 will either be Oct. 1 (Wednesday) or Oct. 2 (Thursday).

Note: I first posted this at Bugs & Cranks. I'm usually not one to promote my stuff, but I hadn't seen anyone else mention this here. (I didn't want to start another epic post like Hostility Abounds a couple of days ago.)

Bumped. Folks if you haven't done it yet, please join us in  giving Gilbert a huge thanks for his incredible effort last two weeks. Of course it goes without saying congrats to all our Bruin men and women for their amazing efforts in Beijing. GO BRUINS. -N

(Cross-posted from my blog.)

UCLA medal winners: Dawn Harper, gold (track, 100m Hurdles); Monique Henderson, gold (track, 4x400m relay); Lauren Cheney, gold (USA soccer); Mark Hunter, gold (rowing, lightweight double sculls); Sheena Tosta, silver (track, 400m Hurdles); Andrea Duran, silver (USA softball); Tairia Flowers, silver (USA softball); Stacey Nuveman, silver (USA softball); Natasha Watley, silver (USA softball); Adam Wright, silver (USA men's water polo); Brandon Brooks, silver (USA men's water polo);  Natalie Golda, silver (USA women's water polo); Jaime Hipp, silver (USA women's water polo); Kim Vandenberg, bronze (swimming, 4x200 relay); Tanya Harding, bronze (Australia softball).

WEEKEND UPDATE:

Sorry I didn't get to this sooner. I was gone and/or busy all weekend. This is my final scheduled update of this post. If I have time this week, I'll put up a special post recapping the medal winners.

Track and Field: Saturday, UCLA's Monique Henderson ran the third leg for the USA 4x400 relay team that won the gold medal. It was Henderson's second gold medal, she was also on the team that won in Athens. The team ran in 3:18.54. Congrats to Monique.

Men's Water Polo Gold Medal game: Hungary 14, USA 10 -- Hungary was the heavy favorite, as they've now won three straight gold medals. The U.S. team battled and kept it close until the fourth quarter. One bright spot for the U.S. was UCLA's Brandon Brooks, who was the backup goalie but came into the game when the starter was struggling and made several big saves to keep the game close. Bruin Adam Wright had an assist. It's USA's first medal since 1988.

FULL LISTINGS BY SPORT (aftter the jump)

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