In the WCC tournament, Pepperdine beats SMC. As a result SMC drops from a 9 seed to a play-in game.
Pepperdine then beats BYU in the Semi-finals. As a result BYU drops from a 4-5 seed to an 8/9 seed.
Pepperdine then beats GU for the auto-bid and "steals" a bit giving the WCC an extra game.
Yes, the WCC got an "extra" game in round 1 from Pepperdine, but did it ultimately reduce the total number of games played due to the more difficult games from the lower seeding resulting in fewer advancing teams?