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Tennis (Women)
Updated February 4, 2011
1. Beginning with the 2011-12 season, the rotation for hosting the conference tournament championship shall rotate between the three regional pods (i.e. Hawai‘i, San Francisco Bay Area, Southwest/SoCal). Recommendations for host sites shall be made by the Commissioner with input from the sports committee and must be approved by the Athletic Directors. (Updated June 2010).
The date for the tournament should be held as close to the second week of April as possible, so to not conflict with finals. The host school shall be responsible for securing a reputable site, for providing manpower for tournament administration, for providing a certified trainer, for providing a sports information person, and for securing and paying appropriate officials' fees.
The field for the PacWest Women’s Tennis Championships shall be limited to eight member institutions (Approved 2009).
2. A Tournament Committee is recommended to made up of five individuals - An assigned administrator from the host school (generally an assistant or associate AD), the head referee, the head coach from the host school, one representative selected by the Conference Commissioner, and the Conference Commissioner. At the very least, the tournament committee should be made up of at least three individuals-including the Conference Commissioner, head coach of the host school, and the head referee. The responsibilities of the Tournament Committee will be to settle all disputes not settled by the head referee. Three officials will be used for the championship match. (Updated June 2011)
3. The Conference Championship will be a consecutive three-day event with each team playing one dual-match each day. An exception is made for any team that will receive a bye due to the number of participating schools.
4. Match structure is three doubles matches (8-game pro-sets with a tiebreak played at 8 games each) followed by six singles matches (two-out-of-three tiebreak sets).
5. All dual matches will be stopped when one team has won the match (earned 5 points under the current D-II match structure).
6. Seeding for the championships will be based on the most recent ITA/NCAA D-II regional ranking. In the case of teams not holding a regional ranking, seeding will be determined by the Tournament Committee with input from the conference head coaches.
7. Head coaches will turn in their proposed line-ups at the pre-tournament coaches meeting, based on the same procedure used at the NCAA championships. The Tournament Committee will review the lineups and determine whether there are any challenges, and deal with appropriately. The Tournament Committee has the right to review the season lineup order of teams whose lineups are challenged, and deal with appropriately. The Tournament Committee has the final word.
8. The order of matches shall be determined by the number of schools participating. #8-#12 assume an 8-team field. (The regulations will need to be appropriately updated if there are more than eight teams participating, including a recommendation that participating schools be guaranteed at least two matches.) The number one seeded team will be placed on the top of the draw and face the #8 seed on Thursday ( or the first day of the tournament) with the #4 and #5 seeded teams playing to enter the semi-finals on Friday.
9. The #2 seeded team will play #7 and the #3 seeded team will play #6 on the lower half of the draw.
10. The winners of 2 vs 7 and 3 vs 6 will meet on Friday (or the second day of the tournament) as will the losers of those same matches.
11. The loser of the #4 vs #5 seeded teams will face the loser between #1 and #8 on Friday.
12. The two unbeaten teams will play for the Conference Championship on Saturday (or the third day of the tournament) along with the two teams playing for 3rd and 4th place (Friday's semi-final championship losers), and the two teams playing for 5th and 6th place (winners of Fridays consolation bracket). The teams having lost both Thursday and Friday matches will play on Saturday and the winner will be awarded 7th place.
13. The Official Ball of the PacWest Championships will be the USPTA ProPenn. The conference will pay for the cost of the balls at the tournament.
14. One USTA certified referee (having passed the ITA Collegiate Referee's exam) will be present at all matches. Three certified referees will be used for the Conference Championship match. The host school will be responsible for providing the referees and will pay their fees.
15. One certified trainer (provided by the host school) will be on site for all matches.
16. All-conference award selection will be determined by the Conference Information Director, based on input from the coaches and the ITA regional rankings. The top six individual players and top three doubles teams in the rankings will be named all-conference, and all other ranked players not named will be accorded honorable mention all-conference honors.
17. Communication for the date, time, and site for the pre-tournament coaches meeting will be the responsibility of the host school head coach. The date, time, and site for the coaches meeting should be provided to the other head coaches and the conference commissioner no later than two weeks prior to the meeting. The host school should also invite the head official and event manager to the meeting. Attendance by all head coaches (or their designated representative) to this annual coaches meeting, plus the conference Commissioner, is mandatory.
18. The Conference Commissioner shall be responsible for handing out appropriate team and individual award plaques at the conclusion of the championship tournament. A plaque for the championship team, the tournament's most valuable player, and tournament's individual sportsmanship winner will be awarded after the championship match. Coaches will nominate and vote on the most valuable player and the sportsmanship award.
19. The Conference Commissioner will work with the host school to determine the site, time, and place of a recommended pre-tournament banquet. Teams will pay the costs of the banquet based on a pre-determined price.
20. All other situations not covered by these conference rules should be referred to the NCAA Championships rules handbook and handled accordingly. All member institutions shall observe the NCAA starting date for pre-season practice regardless of geographic location. No geographic exceptions are allowed. (Updated October 2010)
21. PacWest Conference Women's Tennis Ranking Criteria (8 teams in conference tourney)
Host Team automatically selected as one of eight. Remaining seven teams selected by the following criteria, with ties broken in order by:
- National Ranking (if applicable)
- Regional Ranking (if applicable)
- Head-to-head results
- Match totals if head-to-head results are even*
- Won-loss record versus common opponents
- Match totals of won-loss matches versus common opponents**
- Vote of Conference Head Coaches
*If two teams have played each other twice and have each won one dual match then the total matches won by each team in those two dual matches would be totaled. The team with the greater number of matches won would be ranked higher. For example, team A defeats team B 5-4 on team A's home courts. Team B defeats team A 6-3 on team B's home courts. Team B would have accumulated 10 individual match wins while team A would have accumulated 8 individual match wins. In this scenario team B would be ranked higher than team A.
**The same system would apply if both Team A and Team B won at home 5-4 and they had each played Team C. If they had both beaten Team C then the team with the greatest margin of victory would be ranked higher.
(Note: Although this is significant relating to the team(s) that will not compete in the PacWest Championships it also applies to the seeding of that event. The difference between being seeding 5 and 6 could be important if there were three dominant teams and the team seeded 6 would draw the 3rd seeded team in the first round.)
Selection date for the tournament draw will be the Monday two weeks prior to the week of the conference tournament. Matches held up to the weekend prior to selection date will be counted to determine selection. (February 2011)
