University of Hawaii basketball coaches Eran Ganot and Laura Beeman reacted with moderate enthusiasm to format changes to the men’s and women’s conference tournaments announced by the Big West on Friday.
Starting in the upcoming 2023-24 season, the BWC will run identical four-day, eight-team tournaments on the men’s and women’s side with a staggered bracket format in which the top two seeds get double byes into the semifinals, and the Nos. 3 and 4 seeds get a single bye past the first round.
What You Need To Know
The Big West Conference will place heavier emphasis on regular-season performance in men’s and women’s basketball with a new eight-team postseason tournament format that awards double byes to the top two teams in the standings
UH coaches Eran Ganot and Laura Beeman were in favor of the change
The path to an automatic NCAA berth gets tougher for teams seeded Nos. 5 to 8, which must win four times in four days at Dollar Loan Center in Henderson, Nev.
Also Friday, the Big West announced its first baseball postseason tournament in 2025 will include five teams, and the conference will sponsor swimming and diving starting in 2024-25
