2003 Pacific-10 Conference men's basketball tournament

The 2003 Pacific Life Pacific-10 Conference men's basketball tournament was played between March 13 and March 15, 2003, at Staples Center in Los Angeles, California. The champion of the tournament was Oregon, which received the Pac-10's automatic bid to the NCAA tournament. Upsets defined this tournament, and for the first time, neither Arizona nor UCLA were in the final game. The Most Outstanding Player was Luke Ridnour of Oregon. It was also the first year that longtime sponsor of the tournament, Pacific Life, sponsored the event.

2003 Pacific-10 Conference men's basketball tournament
Classification	Division I
Season	2002–03
Teams	8
Site	Staples Center Los Angeles, California
Champions	Oregon (1st title)
Winning coach	Ernie Kent (1st title)
Pacific-10 Conference men's basketball tournaments

2002–03 Pacific-10 Conference
men's basketball standings

	Conf							Overall
Team	W		L		PCT			W		L		PCT
No. 5 Arizona	17	–	1		.944			28	–	4		.875
No. 20 Stanford	14	–	4		.778			24	–	9		.727
California	13	–	5		.722			22	–	9		.710
Arizona State	11	–	7		.611			20	–	12		.625
Oregon †	10	–	8		.556			23	–	10		.697
Oregon State	6	–	12		.333			13	–	15		.464
USC	6	–	12		.333			13	–	17		.433
UCLA	6	–	12		.333			10	–	19		.345
Washington	5	–	13		.278			10	–	17		.370
Washington State	2	–	16		.111			7	–	20		.259
† 2003 Pac-10 tournament winner As of July 10, 2011 Rankings from Coaches Poll

Seeds

The top eight Pacific-10 schools play in the tournament. Teams are seeded by conference record, with a tiebreaker system used to seed teams with identical conference records.

Seed	School	Conference Record	Tiebreaker
1	Arizona	17–1
2	Stanford	14–4
3	California	13–5
4	Arizona State	11–7
5	Oregon	10–8
6	Oregon State	6–12
7	USC	6–12
8	UCLA	6–12

Bracket

	First Round (March 13)					Semifinals (March 14)					Finals (March 15)
	1	#1 Arizona	89*
	8	UCLA	96
						8	UCLA	74
						5	Oregon	75
	4	Arizona State	82
	5	Oregon	83
											5	Oregon	74
											7	USC	66
	3	#24 California	69
	6	Oregon State	46
						3	#24 California	62
						7	USC	79
	2	#15 Stanford	74
	7	USC	79

Tournament notes

• This tournament opened with the lowest seed, UCLA, stunning top seed and No. 1 ranked Arizona 96–89 in overtime. The second game had another upset with 5 seed Oregon beating 4 seed Arizona State. The upsets continued into the next session with the 7 seed USC beating 2 seed Stanford 79–74. The fourth upset was when USC defeated 3 seed California.
• The championship game featured 5 seed Oregon defeating 7 seed USC 74–66. Oregon, had then become the lowest seed ever to win this tournament (although in later tournaments the 6 seed would win).
• 7 seed USC became the lowest seed ever to make the championship game of the Pac-10 Tournament (still the lowest to date).
• Also of note, this was the first time that neither of the top two seeds were in the final game, and in fact both the 1 and 2 seeds were knocked out in the first round.
• This is the only Pac-10 Tournament in which neither school from Washington participated.
• Arizona set a record for most field goal attempts in one game with 88 vs. UCLA. (33-of-88) (OT). This tournament record still stands.
• Five teams were invited to the 2003 NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Tournament

1. Arizona – 17 1 .944 28–4
2. Stanford – 14 4 .778 24–9
3. California – 13 5 .722 22–9
4. Arizona State – 11 7 .611 20–12
5. Oregon – 10 8 .556 23–10

Arizona was the #1 seed in the West Regional bracket.

All tournament team

• Luke Ridnour, Oregon – Tournament MVP
• James Davis, Oregon
• Luke Jackson, Oregon
• Desmon Farmer, USC
• Rory O'Neil, USC
• Ray Young, UCLA

References

2007–08 Pac-10 Men's Basketball Media Guide pages 50–60 (PDF copy available at 2007–08 Pac-10 Men's Basketball Media Guide)