The NCAA Women's Water Polo Committee focused on future date formulas for the championship during its annual meeting June 24-26 in Washington, D.C.

Although the committee did not take action on the matter during the meeting, members discussed the advantages of moving the championship back one week later, which would avoid Mother's Day but likely conflict with more finals weeks and graduation ceremonies at member schools.

The week before Mother's Day weekend would avoid the high-school swimming championships in California but would create issues with established conference tournaments. The committee believes the conflict with Mother's Day hurts ticket sales.

"We knew any changes to the date formula would be down the road," said Kaia Hedlund, the committee chair who is from the Big West Conference. "Our conversations during this meeting will help us examine the pros and cons for the future. It's a big decision."

Opinions from the water polo community will be solicited before any date changes are considered further.

The committee did emphasize that it does not support a proposed date change for the men's and women's swimming and diving championships. The group cited limited or shared facility space, limited or shared officiating pools, and time demands on coaches who coach both sports as areas of concern.

In other matters, the men's and women's water polo committees will be experimenting during three tournaments this year to examine the benefits of adding one 20-second timeout to the game in addition to the three two-minute timeouts already allowed during the game. The purpose of the timeout would be for substitutions or for a team to set up an offense or defense as needed without a huddle. The information gathered from the men's and women's tournaments during the 2002-03 season will be evaluated during rules discussions next year.