Jul 28, 2010 8:38:09 AM

The NCAA Women's Water Polo Committee is recommending a change to the automatic bid process for the National Collegiate Women's Water Polo Championship to accommodate changes in conference sponsorship.

The committee at its recent annual meeting decided to recommend the awarding of an automatic championship bid to the Big West Conference beginning with the 2011 championship. The committee also proposed a "play-in game" between the fifth- and sixth-ranked team to determine who advances to the final eight. The rankings would be determined by a team's RPI the previous season.

 In 2008, the Big West announced it would add women's water polo as a sponsored sport, and the league played its first season in 2009.

Before the addition of the Big West, five women's water polo conferences received automatic bids (the Western Water Polo Association, the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation, the Collegiate Water Polo Association, the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference and the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference) to the eight-team championship. Because NCAA rules require 50 percent of a sport's championship bracket to be at-large teams, the sport already had a waiver.

Committee chair Matt Anderson, head coach at Michigan, said the change would keep the tournament strong.

"The Big West is a very strong, multi-sport conference. We felt strongly that they should get an automatic bid. We felt strongly that all the conferences that currently have an automatic bid should keep it," he said. "If we have a play-in game like other sports, including lacrosse, it would allow student-athletes from more schools to have an opportunity to make the NCAA tournament, have the championship experience, qualify for the Elite 88 award and have everything else that comes with it."

The recommendation calls for the play-in game to be conducted on the Thursday before the traditional Friday that starts the championship. All sites under contract for the event have been reserved beginning the Wednesday before the usual Friday start.

The proposal will be reviewed by the Division I Championships/Sport Management Cabinet, which meets next in September.