ASSOCIATED PRESS
San Jose State coach Dave Wojcik watches his team during the first half of a Mountain West Conference men’s tournament NCAA college basketball game against Boise State on Wednesday, March 12, 2014, in Las Vegas. (AP Photo/Isaac Brekken)
Thursday, April 3, 2014 | 10:24 a.m.
UNLV football isn’t the only Mountain West program expecting a subpar Academic Progress Rate score in June. San Jose State basketball’s struggles will impact the format of next year’s conference basketball tournament.
San Jose State announced Wednesday the school expected to fall short of the required 930 multiyear APR score and would be banned from postseason play in 2014-15. That includes the conference tournament, which Mountain West spokesman Javan Hedlund told the Fort Collins Coloradoan would change to a 10-team format for the upcoming season.
The conference’s annual meeting of athletic directors comes up on May 5-6 in Phoenix and the exact format the league will use will for the tournament will be one of the main discussions. This was the first season the Mountain West had 11 teams; for its season-ending basketball tournament, the bottom six seeds played on Wednesday while the top five seeds started on Thursday. It's possible the bottom eight seeds would play on the first day with the top two seeds receiving a bye.
The format for the men’s tournament is expected to revert to 11 teams in 2015-16 while the women’s tournament will be unaffected. Both are played at the Thomas & Mack Center.
First-year San Jose State coach Dave Wojcik said he was aware of the program’s situation when he took the job after three seasons as associate head coach at Boise State. Many players didn’t return from the previous year’s team, and the Spartans struggled on the court with a 7-24 record.
“The changes we have implemented are having a positive effect on our program and put us on solid footing moving forward,” Wojcik said in a release, according to the San Jose Mercury News.
Both Wojcik and SJSU Athletic Director Gene Bleymaier have been quoted rather openly on the situation. That’s a contrast to the Rebels’ handling of their situation in football, which is to mostly ignore it until the NCAA releases the official Academic Progress Rate scores in June.
Taylor Bern can be reached at 948-7844 or [email protected]. Follow Taylor on Twitter at twitter.com/taylorbern.
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