South Carolina will try to add to its trophy case when the NCAA women’s basketball tournament begins this week.
The Gamecocks join UCLA, USC and Texas as the four top seeds in the 68-team bracket. The tournament begins Wednesday and Thursday with the First Four matchups, with first-round play beginning Friday.
South Carolina is the defending champion after it beat Iowa last year in a title game watched by an audience of 18.7 million, record viewership for a women’s college basketball game. South Carolina also won NCAA titles under coach Dawn Staley in 2022 and 2017.
Tampa, Florida, will host the Final Four on April 4 and the national championship on April 6.
Before the tournament begins, NBC News breaks down the teams and players to know.
The top seed I’m most worried about
Nadkarni: I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I may be going with the Southern California Trojans here. First off, it’s all relative, because I feel very good about all the top seeds in this bracket. Heck, the Trojans have a case to be the No. 1 overall seed considering how they’ve played the Bruins this season. My lone worry? USC was only sixth in the NCAA’s NET rankings formula, with three Quadrant 1 losses. (Did two other No. 1 seeds also have three Quadrant 1 losses? Yes, but we’re splitting the finest of hairs here.)
Greif: Texas wins with defense — it has held opponents to 55.9 points per game, which has produced the nation’s second-best scoring margin (23.0 points per game). This is a team that hasn’t broken through to a Final Four under coach Vic Shaefer, but it has played in a regional final in three of the past four years, so there is plenty of experience. The only thing that makes me wary is the Longhorns’ 29.6% 3-point shooting on the season, which ranks 243rd out of 353 Division I teams and more than 100 spots lower than any other No. 1 seed.
Auerbach: Texas. When we talk about parity in the women’s game, what we really mean is the depth at the top of the sport. There are legitimately six to eight teams good enough to cut down the nets this year, which means that it’s hard to pencil all the No. 1 seeds into the Final Four like we used to do.
I’m most worried about Texas because the Longhorns have a hot TCU team as the No. 2 seed in their region as well as No. 3 Notre Dame. The Horned Frogs have a ton of NCAA Tournament experience on that roster, most notably with Hailey Van Lith and Sedona Prince, while the Fighting Irish have been among the best teams in the country all season long — and even had the No. 1 ranking in the AP poll at one point — before struggling a bit (losing three of five) heading into Selection Sunday. I sure wouldn’t want to draw the Notre Dame guards with their season on the line, though!
The Cinderella story of the tournament will be …
Nadkarni: The Iowa Hawkeyes. The Hawkeyes were 6-2 in neutral-site games this year and also had six Quadrant 1 victories. This program has some institutional success, as well, thanks to the Caitlin Clark years. Again, this is such a top-heavy field it’s hard to pick a true Cinderella. Iowa isn’t on a lot of radars, however, and maybe the combination of Lucy Olsen and the Final Four holdovers can make some noise.
Greif: Historically, Cinderella has a ceiling in the women’s tournament. No team seeded fourth or lower has ever won a national championship game, and no team seeded 10th or lower has ever advanced to a Final Four. Tenth-seeded South Dakota State, though, has the pedigree to wreck some brackets, having gone undefeated in conference play for three consecutive seasons. The Jackrabbits made the Sweet 16 in 2019. If they beat seventh-seeded Oklahoma State in the first round, they’ll face the winner of Connecticut-Arkansas State in the round of 32.
Auerbach: Florida Gulf Coast has long been the team no one wants to draw in the women’s tournament. For years, that was because of the creativity and schemes of head coach Karl Smesko. He’s now the head coach of the WNBA’s Atlanta Dream, but this program hasn’t skipped a beat under first-year head coach Chelsea Lyles, who was named the Atlantic Sun Coach of the Year.
Another potential Cinderella is Harvard, led by star guard Harmoni Turner. The Crimson are a No. 10 seed, and a 10-over-7 upset is not necessarily Cinderella-esque, but if they were to take out North Carolina State in the second round …
Players I’m most excited to watch
Nadkarni: The Connecticut Huskies will never quite be an underdog, although they’ll probably make the case for themselves as one with their No. 2 seed. For that reason my pick is Paige Bueckers.
As the undisputed No. 1 option for the Huskies, with a group that’s a little inexperienced, Bueckers will have to dominate for Connecticut to make its second straight Final Four or win its first title since 2016. With this being Bueckers’ last tournament, I expect her to go out with a bang.
Greif: Harvard’s Harmoni Turner, who just dropped 44 points in the semifinals of the Ivy League tournament to set single-game records for both the program and the conference tournament. It wasn’t a flash in the pan, either; Turner had scored 33 points one game earlier, and she scored 41 and 38 points in consecutive games in November. The 10th-seeded Crimson face seventh-seeded Michigan State.
Auerbach: JuJu Watkins, Hannah Hidalgo and Paige Bueckers.
I’ve got to go with the biggest stars here, and no one in women’s college basketball is shining brighter than JuJu these days. She is a spectacular scorer, but we’ve also seen her dazzle us with her passing and shot-blocking ability. I can’t wait to watch her try to will USC back to the Final Four for the first time in nearly four decades.
Notre Dame’s Hidalgo is fearless on the court and ferocious on the defensive end, specifically. She’s so fun to watch, especially this season as she shares a backcourt with Olivia Miles (who was injured last year and not part of the Irish’s postseason push). This team enters the NCAA Tournament on a bit of a slump, but Hidalgo has enough energy to single-handedly jolt the Irish back into form.
I’m also not ready to say goodbye to the UConn star Bueckers just yet, and I certainly do not want to see the Huskies or Trojans falter before we get a star-studded Elite 8 matchup that would feature two of the best individual basketball players in the sport. Bueckers’ career has had some very high highs and some brutal injury-plagued lows, but she remains magnetic and must-see TV for as long as we’ve got her in college hoops.
Final Four and national title picks
Nadkarni: UCLA, UConn, South Carolina and Texas, with UCLA winning it all.
Greif: Notre Dame, UCLA, USC and South Carolina. Crown USC, which has no fear factor after having beaten top overall seed UCLA twice this season and featuring JuJu Watkins, the best player in the tournament.
Auerbach: UCLA, Duke, Notre Dame and USC. The Trojans win the national title. JuJu has great pieces around her, but ultimately this history-making moment for the the team will come down to her. And she’ll be more than ready for it.
