March 6, 2011

Bracket

RUSTON - Following Saturday's final regular season games, the seeding and bracket has been set for the upcoming Western Athletic Conference Tournament which will be held at the Orleans Arena in Las Vegas March 9-12.

With its 65-55 victory over Idaho, the Louisiana Tech Lady Techsters clinched the outright WAC regular season title - the programs eighth in 10 years of membership in the league - and will be the No. 1 seed in the tournament. Fresno State earned the No. 2 seed and both the Lady Techsters and the Bulldogs will earn a double bye all the way to Friday's semifinals.

The rest of the seeding for the eight-team field includes No. 3 seed Utah State, No. 4 seed Nevada, No. 5 seed Idaho, No. 6 seed New Mexico State, No. 7 seed Hawaii and No. 8 seed Boise State. San Jose State finished last in the WAC standings and thus did not qualify for the tournament.

The action begins Wednesday when Idaho plays Boise State and New Mexico State plays Hawaii. The winner of the Idaho-Boise State game will advance to Thursday's quarterfinals to play Nevada. The winner of the New Mexico State-Hawaii game advances to play Utah State.

Friday's semifinals will include Louisiana Tech facing the survivor of the trio of Nevada, Idaho and Boise State. Fresno State will face the lone team remaining from the Utah State, New Mexico State and Hawaii group.

LA Tech's semifinal game on Friday will tipoff at 2 p.m. CT while the championship game is set for Saturday at 3 p.m. CT on ESPNU. Tech fans can listen to all of the Lady Techster action on the LA Tech Sports Network.

The Lady Techsters enter the tournament with a 23-6 mark after recording a 15-1 record in Western Athletic Conference regular season action. Tech is currently ranked 30th in the most recent RPI while all six of its losses this year have come against teams that have won 20 or more games.

Tech has won 16 of its last 17 games entering the WAC Tournament.

LA Tech will be playing for its sixth WAC Tournament title in the last 10 years.