NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament to Seed Teams by True Rankings

Starting next year, the NCAA women’s basketball tournament will bracket teams based on their exact rankings, irrespective of conference membership.

Previously, the tournament safeguarded top conference teams by placing the top four in different regions. For instance, the 2022 event featured four SEC teams in the top eight seeds: Texas third, South Carolina fourth, LSU fifth, and Vanderbilt seventh. However, LSU was moved to seventh and Vanderbilt to eighth to prevent bracket overlap.

Moving forward, teams will remain in their seed positions based on performance metrics.

“‘We meticulously evaluated the top 16 teams’ performance to determine their seed order,’ Braun stated. ‘Fine-tuning distinctions among teams would undermine the merit-based placements these teams achieved.’”

The men’s selection committee will continue placing the top four seeds from each conference into separate regions.

This reform primarily impacts the SEC, ACC, Big Ten, and Big 12 conferences, as they historically supplied four or more teams to the NCAA field.

This adjustment follows the NCAA’s expansion of the tournament field to 76 teams, set to begin in 2027.

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