BRIDGEPORT, Pa. — The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) approved the expansion of the men’s water polo championship field to nine teams for the 2023 season.
The expansion comes about following a decision by the NCAA Competition Oversight Committee (COC) to approve granting the Big West and West Coast Conferences relief from the two-year waiting period for automatic qualification, thus making them eligible for AQs to the 2023 National Collegiate Men’s Water Polo Championship. Both conferences previously had teams participating in single-sport conferences. Beginning in 2023-24, however, both conferences will meet the minimum of six sponsoring institutions, thus eliminating a single-sport conference. While the AQ legislation indicates there are no exceptions for the waiting period, the COC believed having multi-sport conferences participating rather than single-sport conferences is in the best interests of the sport.
Further, the COC supported increasing the championship bracket from eight teams to nine teams to accommodate the additional automatic qualifier that resulted in granting the exception to the two conferences noted above while maintaining the two current at-large berths. The additional automatic qualifier increases the championship access for men’s water polo to 18 percent of teams from 16 percent; this compares to 15 percent for women’s water polo which has a 10-team bracket.
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