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MALIBU, Calif. -- The Pepperdine baseball team secured a spot in the WCC Tournament with a 17-3 win over Gonzaga on Saturday afternoon. The Waves scored 17 runs on 18 hits, both season highs for the team.

Pepperdine locked up one of three remaining spots in the four-team postseason tournament with the win, moving to 26-26 overall and 16-10 WCC. With BYU grabbing a postseason berth as well on Saturday, LMU and San Francisco will play for the final spot tomorrow. The Waves and Zags also play tomorrow at 1 p.m., with tournament seeding still on the line. San Diego is the only team locked in seeding-wise after clinching the WCC title last weekend.

"This is what we were all looking for today," said head coach Steve Rodriguez, who takes the Waves to the WCC Tournament for the second time in the past three years since the four-team playoff was instituted in 2013. "Once you get into the postseason it's about who gets hot and who plays well, then you just hope the best team advances. Last year we did a great job of that and hopefully that continues this year."

The WCC Tournament will be held at Banner Island Ballpark in Stockton, Calif. May 21-23. The tournament winner will secure the conference's automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.

Pepperdine's convincing win over the Zags came a day after the Waves gave up a late three run lead to a scrappy Gonzaga squad. The home team made sure on Saturday to put it out of reach early on.

After Gonzaga jumped on top 1-0 in the second inning, the Waves scored four runs on five hits in the third to go up 4-1. Pepperdine was far from finished, following that up with a 10-run fourth inning to put the game well out of reach.

The Waves sent 15 players to the plate and recorded nine hits in the fourth inning to put up the double-digit run total. Chris Fornaci (Walnut Creek, Calif./De La Salle HS) put the exclamation point on the frame with a grand slam to left field that made it 14-1. Kolten Yamaguchi (Kona, Hawai'i/Konawaena HS) had two singles and an RBI in the inning and Brandon Caruso (Pasadena, Calif./Loyola HS) hit a two-run double. Eight of the nine Waves in the order got hits in the fourth.

"We just got quality at-bats today," said Rodriguez. "We took advantage of some of the free bases they gave us and made them pay with some key hits. That's what it's about, you have to take advantage of their miscues and then get two-out hits and good pitching. We did all of that today."

With a comfortable cushion, A.J. Puckett (Danville, Calif./De La Salle HS) did plenty to hold the Zags in check through his 6.0 innings pitched. Puckett scattered eight hits and struck out five, while giving up three earned runs to pick up his seventh win of the year. Gonzaga scored two runs on a single in the sixth, but the Waves' righty stranded runners on first and third with a groundout to limit the damage before he exited the game.

The Waves bullpen then came in and shut out Gonzaga the rest of the way, with Chandler Blanchard (Henderson, Nev./Coronado HS), Max Green (Rolling Hills Estate, Calif./Palos Verdes Peninsula HS) and Kiko Garcia (Chula Vista, Calif./St. Augustine HS) each tossing a scoreless inning.

Brad Anderson (Yorba Linda, Calif./Esperanza HS), Caruso and Yamaguchi all had three-hit days for the Waves and Fornaci's four RBI led all players. Caruso also drove in three runs, as five Waves had multi-RBI days.

Justin Jacobs went 3-for-4 at the plate for the Zags and Joey Harris drove in three runs. Gonzaga falls to 24-27, 14-12 WCC and is eliminated from postseason contention with the loss.