UCLA Top-Seeded in Tournament

It’s a major achievement to win the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation’s postseason water polo tournament. It’s also been a curse the past four years.

Competition for the conference title begins today at UC Irvine. The tournament, which runs through Sunday, features the top eight ranked teams in the nation.

UC San Diego, ranked ninth, and Massachusetts, ranked 10th, are the only teams in the top 10 outside the conference.

How competitive is it? USC, the nation’s No. 1-ranked team, isn’t the top-seeded team in the MPSF tournament. Second-ranked UCLA, because of its better conference record, is the No. 1 seed.

Winning the tournament hasn’t been a steppingstone to the national title. While the NCAA champion has come from the conference every year since it was formed in 1992, the last four seasons that team wasn’t the MPSF tournament champion.

USC lost in the MPSF semifinals last season, then beat conference tournament champion Stanford in the NCAA title game. The three previous NCAA champions--California, UCLA and Pepperdine--did not win the conference tournament.

Tournament champions from the MPSF, the Collegiate Water Polo Assn. and the Western Water Polo Assn., automatically qualify for the four-team national tournament, which will be Dec. 4-5 at UC San Diego. Also selected is an at-large team, which has come from the MPSF since 1992.

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Water Polo

* What: Mountain Pacific Sports Federation Men’s Water Polo Championships

* When: Today-Sunday

* Where: Anteater Aquatics Center, UC Irvine (adjacent to Crawford Hall)

* At stake: Winner earns automatic berth into NCAA Championships at UC San Diego, Dec. 4-5.

* Today’s schedule: 9 a.m.--Game 1: No. 9 UC Irvine (7-16) vs. No. 8 UC Santa Barbara (10-13); 10:30--Game 2: No. 4 California (12-10) vs. No. 5 Long Beach State (12-12); noon--Game 3: No. 3 USC (20-4) vs. No. 6 Pacific (13-11); 1:30 p.m.--Game 4: No. 2 Stanford (19-4) vs. No. 7 Pepperdine (12-11); 3 p.m.--Game 5: No. 1 UCLA (17-3) vs. Winner Game 1.

* Saturday’s schedule: 9 a.m.--Game 6: Losers 2 vs. 5 (consolation semifinal); 10:30--Game 7: Losers 3 vs. 4 (consolation semifinals); noon--Game 8: Winners 2 vs. 5 (championship semifinal); 1:30 p.m.--Game 9: Winners 3 vs. 4 (championship semifinal).

* Sunday’s schedule: 9 a.m.--Game 10: Losers 6 vs. 7 (seventh place); 10:30--Game 11: Winners 6 vs. 7 (fifth place); noon--Game 12: Losers 8 vs. 9 (third place); 1:30--Game 13: Winners 8 vs. 9 (championship).

* Admission: $20 for three-day pass, $15 for two-day pass, $10 for single day.

* Information: (949) 824-6202