What can Adding Two New Teams to the Conference do for the WCC?
The West Coast Conference has become a main stay in the NCAA tournament because of their two powerhouse programs Saint Mary’s and Gonzaga. Gonzaga is obviously the more well known and dominant team. As they have made the tournament each of the last twenty-five tournaments. Saint Mary’s on the other hand is a newer riser but they have made the tournament in the last 3 seasons. The reason this conference could never truly ascend to the level that they hoped for is because no teams have been able to compete with Saint Mary’s and Gonzaga for a while now. Now they have added Grand Canyon and Seattle University with the hopes of adding some up-and-coming basketball programs to compete with the top two schools.
After playing the West Coast Conference's regular season and conference champion winner each of the last two seasons in the tournament Grand Canyon has joined the WCC. The first of the seasons as a 14 seed the Antelopes lost to Gonzaga but last season as a 12 seed they upset Saint Mary’s. The main issue for the conference over the last two decades is that no team has been able to come even close to either Gonzaga or Saint Mary’s when it comes to basketball success. In the last 21 seasons no team outside of those two has won the regular season title and only one team has won the conference tournament (2008 San Diego). By KenPom rankings this year team for Grand Canyon would have finished in the top three eight of the last ten years and top 4 in every year. The Lopes will be competing with the top tier of WCC teams for a tournament spot right away. This allows for not only more fun basketball in the WCC but also a better chance for Saint Mary’s and Gonzaga to bolster their resume in conference play. From a conference perspective having another tournament caliber team will increase TV ratings immensely. College basketball fans are turned into almost every Gonzaga v. Saint Mary’s in conference game and adding a program like Grand Canyon offers another couple games that are worth the national spotlight. Every fan of college basketball should be particularly excited about the Lopes joining the WCC. This impact is going to be seen immediately as Grand Canyon returns a very good roster including their star player Tyon Grant-Foster. The WAC POY averaged over 20 points per game last season and averaged 25.5 points in his two tournament games last year. Including dropping 29 points on Alabama and really single handedly giving the lopes a chance to win that game. Fans should expect Grand Canyon to easily be a top three team in the WCC next season and compete for the Auto Bid in the first season.
The other school in Seattle University has not had a great basketball program for decades, but they are trending in the since hiring their current coach, Chris Victor. In his three years as the head coach, they have won more than 20 games each year and won the CBI this year. This season, they won 23 games which is the most wins they have had at the division one level since they had Elgin Baylor in the 1957 season. Seattle is not going to come in and immediately compete for conference titled but they will be a top half team right away with the potential to keep improving and compete for titles in the future. Which is what makes this a great add for the conference. A lot of the teams in the conference now have never competed for conference titles because of the dominance of Gonzaga. Seattle has the geographic capability and the coaching to become a perennial contender in the WCC. This upcoming season the Redhawks return most of their roster and add one transfer in Maleek Arington from Idaho State. The 6-3 guard averaged 12 points and 5 assists last season in the Big Sky conference. One area where he could improve is his shooting. He shot just 26% from beyond the arc. Nevertheless, this is still a great pick up for the Redhawks who will be a top half team in the conference and might just finish fourth behind Grand Canyon, Gonzaga, and Saint Mary’s
The consequences for the other conference in the Western Athletic Conference who is losing both of these teams is a more competitive conference but also, they are losing the top end talent. Grand Canyon has won the conference tournament three of the last four years and it was beginning to seem like Grand Canyons financial advantage was going to make them a main stay at the top of the conference. So, while they are losing the school that has brought them the most national attention over the last half decade it could end up being a good thing for the conference. Without Grand Canyon there are 4-5 teams who are going to be able to legitimately compete for the auto bid every season, which is fun and better for all of the schools. On the other hand, losing Seattle University seems like a no upside subtraction from the conference. Seattle is a program that is just ascending and could provide the conference with one of those magical deep tournament runs because of their geographical area and coach. Overall, this move makes sense for the WAC in the sense that more teams are going to be able to actually compete but it is going to lower their nationally relevancy so there is some give and take with this move.
