GULF SHORES — The USC Women of Troy’s run at a fourth straight NCAA Beach Volleyball National Championship is set to begin with an unknown opponent.

The bottom two seeds in the recently expanded 17-team bracket will kick off the single-elimination tournament Friday morning, May 3, at Gulf Place Beach where the winner will draw the top overall seed. The quarter and semifinals are set for Saturday before the 2024 champion is crowned on Sunday.

Last weekend was Selection Sunday where the bracket was officially constructed for this weekend’s competition.

Nine conference champions punched their tickets to the national tournament as automatic qualifiers and eight more teams were chosen at-large.

The top three teams — Southern California, UCLA and Stanford — all hail from the Pac-12 before Florida State (Coastal Collegiate Sports Association) and Cal Poly (Big West runner-up) round out the top five.

Other conference champions include TCU (Conference USA) at No. 6, Loyola Marymount (West Coast Conference) at No. 8 and Hawaii (Big West) at No. 9. Georgia State (Sun Belt), Texas A&M-Corpus Christi (Southland), North Florida (Atlantic Sun) and Chattanooga (Ohio Valley) round out the bottom four seeds.

California (No. 7), Arizona State (No. 12) and Washington (No. 13) help make the Pac-12 the most-represented conference at the tournament with six total teams. Long Beach State (No. 10) gives the Big West three squads for second place and LSU (No. 11) marks two teams from the CCSA.

Barring an upset, USC would draw the victor of the LMU-Hawaii match in the quarterfinals. The UCLA Bruins, winners of the other two NCAA championships not won by the Women of Troy, sit on the opposite end of the bracket as the No. 2 with a first-round contest scheduled against A&M-CC.