Los Angeles, CA (April 30) - The 2007 Western Water Polo Association Champion Loyola Marymount University has been seeded fifth for the 2007 National Collegiate Women's Water Polo Championship. They will play fourth-seed San Diego State in the first round on Friday, May 11 at 6:45 p.m.

The championship will be held May 11-13 at Joint Forces Training Base, in Los Alamitos, California. Long Beach State University will serve as the host institution. The NCAA Championship will be an eight-team, single-elimination tournament (12 games), with a losers' bracket to determine places three through eight.

LMU and San Diego State met twice during the regular season with both teams earning wins in neutral pools. LMU took the first meeting on Feb. 11, 8-6, and SDSU won on Feb. 25, 8-6 in overtime. The Lions lead the all-time series 9-6.

The Lions (26-5) will head to the tournament winners of their sixth WWPA title in the last seven years and the sixth WWPA Player of the Year in the same time period. Senior Stacia Peterson was named the WWPA's top player for 2007 following the conclusion of the tournament. Peterson is just the fifth player in LMU history to win four WWPA titles and take her team to the NCAA tournament in four seasons at LMU.

She led the Lions with 60 goals in 2007, which is the third most in a single season in the 10 years at LMU. She now holds three of the four top spots in the record books. She has 221 goals in her time at LMU, second behind Lucy Windes 239.

Peterson, who also earned All-WWPA first-team honors for the second time in her career, was joined by four others on All-WWPA teams. Joining Peterson on the first-team was senior Cara Colton. In her fourth year at LMU, Colton set a career-high with 50 goals, 16 assists and shattered her career-high in steals with 61.

Senior Katie Hicks was named second-team All-WWPA while senior Sarah Hamilton and sophomore Kaylee Caster were named honorable mention. Hicks scored 41 goals this season to give her 202 in her career, ranking third all-time at LMU. Hamilton tallied 18 goals for the Lions with 23 steals. Caster, who was named LMU's newcomer of the year, was the Lions biggest surprise in making 278 saves with a goals against average at 6.84. She allowed just 11 goals in the WWPA tournament this past weekend.

LMU makes their sixth trip to the NCAA tournament as the No. 5 seed. The No. 1 seed was awarded to Stanford (25-2) and the No. 2 seed was awarded to the University of California, Los Angeles (25-2). UCLA will face No. 7 seed Pomona-Pitzer College (20-9) on May 11 in the first game of the championship at 1:30 p.m. The next game will feature No. 3 seed, the University of Southern California (20-5) and No. 6 seed Hartwick College (29-9) at 3:15 p.m.

Stanford will face No. 8 seed Wagner College (17-13) in the third game of the day at 5 p.m. The final contest of the night will pit No. 5 seed Loyola Marymount University LMU the Aztecs (27-8) at 6:45 p.m.

The following conferences and institutions received automatic qualification: Collegiate Water Polo Association, Hartwick; Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference, Wagner; Mountain Pacific Sports Federation, UCLA; Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference, Pomona-Pitzer; and Western Water Polo Association, Loyola Marymount. The following institutions received at-large bids to the championship field: Stanford, Southern California, and San Diego State.

For more information about the National Collegiate Women's Water Polo Championship and the complete 2007 championship bracket, log on to www.ncaasports.com.