Mar 16, 2025, 08:18 PM ET
UCLA is the highest total seed within the ladies’s NCAA event. The Bruins had been joined by means of South Carolina, USC and Texas because the No. 1 seeds that the NCAA published Sunday evening.
It is the first time at school historical past that the Bruins are the highest crew within the event. That they had two losses at the season, either one of which got here to the Trojans.
Break of day Staley felt her South Carolina crew will have to get the No. 1 total seed; however in contrast to remaining yr, when the Gamecocks completed off an undefeated season with a countrywide name, this crew has 3 losses heading into March Insanity, together with one to the Bruins.
“Two key components between UCLA and South Carolina. One was once the head-to-head matchup,” NCAA variety committee chair Derita Dawkins informed Holly Rowe all through ESPN’s variety display Sunday evening. “The opposite was once one among our standards is aggressive in losses, and South Carolina suffered a 29-point loss to UConn. The ones had been the 2 key variations in the ones résumés.”
Staley’s crew is having a look to be the primary to copy as champion since UConn gained 4 immediately from 2013 to 2016. The Gamecocks are contemporary off a season through which they posted a 30-3 document that culminated with a win over Texas in remaining week’s SEC event name recreation. Headed into the league tourney, South Carolina was once ranked 5th within the nation and projected to be a No. 2 seed.
“I am slightly bit shocked as a result of we manufactured our time table to be the No. 1 total seed,” Staley informed Rowe. “It is arduous sufficient to win a countrywide championship; we do not want a chip on our shoulder.”
The Huskies, who’re a 2-seed, need to finish that drought with big name Paige Bueckers. UConn should move out West if it reaches the Candy 16, and a possible rematch with JuJu Watkins and the Trojans may well be ready within the Elite 8.
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“There may be numerous other ways you’ll move with that. You’ll say, ‘I want we did not have USC in the market, in the best way, most likely going to the Ultimate 4,'” UConn trainer Geno Auriemma stated. “[But] regardless of who you find yourself taking part in, it will be a ache within the ass. That is all there’s to it. You simply hope to be in that recreation.”
USC, in the meantime, wasn’t extremely joyful with its draw a lot, both.
“I by no means concept I might be a 1-seed and really feel disrespected,” USC trainer Lindsay Gottlieb stated, when requested concerning the Trojans touchdown because the fourth No. 1 seed. “Every now and then, I do not perceive the individuals who make selections in ladies’s faculty basketball and why they do what they do.”
The trail for all may not be simple: This yr, there may be extra parity within the recreation. This NCAA event will likely be handiest the second prior to now 19 years to don’t have any groups coming into March Insanity with 0 or one loss. The opposite time was once in 2022.
“I believe enthusiasts need to see just right basketball,” Dawkins stated when requested about the opportunity of the 4 No. 1s to converge on the Ultimate 4 subsequent month in Tampa, Florida. “And they’ll see that. I believe the groups should be seeded and bracketed in step with the paintings they have completed all yr at the courtroom. And that’s the reason what we did.”
The Trojans and Bruins, learners within the Large Ten this season, will attempt to win the primary nationwide championship for the convention since 1999, when Purdue gained the lone crown. A document 12 groups from the Large Ten are within the box. The SEC has 10 and the ACC 8. The Large 12 has seven.
The Ivy League gained 3 bids for the primary time. Remaining season, Columbia earned the second one at-large bid in league historical past. The Lions are again once more in addition to Princeton. Each are 11-seeds and will likely be competing in play-in video games. Harvard, which gained the convention event, is a 10-seed.
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Duke, TCU and NC State joined the Huskies at the 2-seed line. Notre Dame boasts wins over Texas, USC and UConn however slumped the previous few weeks of the common season and fell to a 3-seed.
William & Mary is one among six groups set to make a primary look within the ladies’s NCAA event. The others are Arkansas State, Fairleigh Dickinson, George Mason, Grand Canyon and UC San Diego. The Tribe (15-18) are the primary sub-.500 crew since Incarnate Phrase in 2022 to make the tourney.
Virginia Tech, James Madison, Saint Joseph’s and Colorado had been the primary 4 groups ignored of the sphere.
For the primary time in NCAA historical past, there will likely be a monetary incentive for ladies’s groups. They’re going to receives a commission for his or her leads to the NCAA event identical to the boys have for years.
So-called efficiency gadgets, which constitute income, will likely be given to girls’s groups for each and every win they get. A crew that reaches the Ultimate 4 may just deliver its convention more or less $1.26 million over the following 3 years in monetary efficiency rewards.
This comes a yr after the ladies’s championship recreation that noticed South Carolina beat Caitlin Clark and Iowa do higher TV scores then the boys’s name recreation.
The Related Press contributed to this document.
