INDIANAPOLIS – The NCAA Division III Women's Soccer Committee announced on Monday the field of 64 teams for the 2017 Division III Women's Soccer Championship. The Regals received an at-large berth and will host UC Santa Cruz at 5:30 p.m. Saturday in a first round matchup.
The 64-team field is comprised of selections from Pool A (automatic qualifications (AQ) from a conference), B (independent schools and school that are members of conferences that do not meet the requirements for automatic qualification) and C (schools from AQ conferences that were not the conference champion and any remaining Pool B teams). This year, forty-three conferences were awarded automatic qualification for the 2017 championship, one team was selected from Pool B and the final 20 berths went to Pool C teams.
Sixteen four-team sites will conduct first- and second-round play on the first weekend of the championship, Nov., 10 and 11 or 11 and 12.
Cal Lutheran will be hosting its four-team pod on Nov., 11 and 12. The Regals (15-3-2) will play UC Santa Cruz (5-14-1) Saturday in the first game with the start time set at 5:30 p.m. Pacific Lutheran (16-3-1) and Whittier (12-8) will kick off the second game at 8. The winners advance to the second-round and will play Sunday at 7.
During the year, CLU defeated UCSC 1-0 on Oct. 2. The Regals swept Whittier in the reguar season with scores of 2-1 (2OT) and 2-0, but lost to them 3-2 (OT) in the first round of the SCIAC Tournament. Cal Lutheran and Pacific Lutheran haven't played this year.
Second-round winners will advance to one of four sectional sites November 17 and 18 or 18 and 19. All games, except the semifinals and final, will be played on the campuses of competing institutions. Winners of the four sectionals will advance to the semifinals December 1 and 2, at UNCG Soccer Stadium in Greensboro, North Carolina, with the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and Greensboro Sports Commission serving as hosts.
The Regals are in the NCAA Division III Tournament for the 13th time. The farthest CLU has gone is the Sweet 16.
Bracket: 2017 NCAA Division III Soccer Tournament Bracket
Release: 2017 NCAA Division III Soccer Tournament Release
CLU Instagram: http://instagram.com/clusports#
CLU Twitter: https://twitter.com/clusports
CLU Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/clusports
Hashtags: #clusports #ownthethrone #goregals #gokingsmen #theSCIAC #ncaad3
Release by Ryan Jorgenson, Sports Information Director
