Cats tabbed the top seed

The Saddleback women's soccer team found out on Sunday that it has been named the top seed for the upcoming 3C2A Southern California Regional Tournament.  The Bobcats will open the playoffs on Saturday.

Saddleback pulled out an exciting finish in the Orange Empire Conference (OEC) championship on Friday when it defeated Santiago Canyon College in the final minutes, 1-0.  The Bobcats finished No. 1 in the south in power points for the season while finishing No. 2 in the state.

Saddleback was 15-2-3 overall and 10-1-3 in the Orange Empire Conference, claiming the title in a conference that finished 24 games above .500 and had five teams qualify for the playoffs.

Saddleback will face the winner of San Bernardino Valley College (10-5-5) and Mt. San Jacinto College (9-8-2), who were seeded No. 16 and No. 17, respectively.  San Bernardino Valley will host Mt. San Jacinto in the opening round of the tournament on Wednesday. 

Joining Saddleback in their bracket was fellow OEC rivals Cypress College (4), Orange Coast College (8) and Golden West College (12).  Santiago Canyon was named the top seed in the other Southern California Regional and given the No. 2 overall seed as OEC programs took home the 1-2-4-8-12 seeds for the south.  The Orange Empire Conference has had a representative in each of the last six state title games, winning state championships in 2018 (Santiago Canyon), 2019 (Santiago Canyon) and 2022 (Saddleback).  

Saddleback has tentatively set a start time of 7:00 PM for the game on Saturday night.  The winner of that game would advance to the third round on November 25.

3C2A SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA REGIONAL (Saddleback Bracket)