The Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference has added a conference tournament for men's basketball and will award its automatic bid to the tournament winner.

The SCIAC, which was one of two conferences without a tournament, will play a four-team bracket this season. The University Athletic Association, with members from St. Louis to Boston, is the last remaining conference without a tournament.

In women's basketball, the SCIAC coaches picked defending champion La Verne as its preseason No. 1, with seven first-place votes, while Occidental got the remaining top nod and finished second overall.

Occidental, Redlands and Claremont-Mudd-Scripps round out the top five, with Pomona-Pitzer and Whittier tied for sixth and Caltech eighth.

La Verne will be led by D3hoops.com West Region Player of the Year Trenecca Jones, who along with Marissa Raya were named to the SCIAC's preseason watch list.

Oct. 15 is the first permissible day of practice for Division III basketball teams that open on Nov. 16, though some conferences restrict further than the NCAA does and practice starts later.