Thirty-eight former Waves have been drafted or played in the NBA including Doug Christie and Dennis Johnson, an inductee of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.

Pepperdine would join the West Coast Conference for the 1955-56 season with their long time rival Loyola Marymount and on November, 30th, 1973 they constructed Firestone Fieldhouse on campus near Malibu, California.

[6] Two years later the 1975-76 Pepperdine squad would win their second WCC regular-season championship under head coach Gary Colson and advance to their third NCAA Tournament, defeating the University of Memphis in the first round.

Their trip to the 1983 tournament was particularly memorable as Pepperdine would take eventual national champion North Carolina State to double overtime.

Although the Waves eventually fell 69-67, it was the closest game NC State played the entire tournament as they defeated their next five opponents all in regulation by an average of six points.

Jan van Breda Kolff would then take over the program and lead Pepperdine to their twelfth NCAA Tournament appearance in 2000.

The eleventh-seeded Waves would become the Cinderella team of the tournament and upset the Indiana Hoosiers in the first round in what would become Bob Knight’s final game as the program’s coach.

[9] Over the next two years the Waves would build on this success posting a record of 44–18 and return to both the NIT in 2001 and the program’s thirteenth NCAA Tournament in 2002.

Colbey Ross is also the first player in NCAA Division I men’s basketball history to accumulate totals of at least 2,200 points, 800 assists and 400 rebounds.

Two years later his 2020-21 squad would win the program’s first ever postseason tournament, the 2021 College Basketball Invitational, by defeating Coastal Carolina 84–61.

The last team to do this were the 1954-57 San Francisco Dons led by Bill Russell who set the then-record at 31 consecutive games.

This span includes season sweeps against programs LMU (just one year removed from their NCAA Tournament run to the Elite 8), Gonzaga, and Saint Mary’s.

The Streak came to an end in January 1993 when, ironically, the previous record holders San Francisco defeated the Waves 75-72.

[22] Over 30 years later no West Coast Conference team has ever won more than 38 consecutive league games and The Streak stands as a key part of WCC history that remains unmatched to this day.

The first game of the 177-game series was played in the 1940-41 season, fifteen years before both teams joined the West Coast Conference.