One Big Thing In Every NCAA WBB Conference Tournament: Wednesday, March 5th

It's officially March Madness, so let's get you up to speed with what we're watching for in each major conference tournament happening this week...

Julia Hansen/Iowa City Press-Citizen / USA TODAY NETWORK

Hello, friends! We have officially made it to March Madness, Part One. Conference Tournaments kick off this week and, while there are few that take place a bit later in the month, most of the mid-major action is centered around the next half-dozen days. The high-majors also dominate the week with the SEC, ACC, Big 12 and Big Ten starting Tuesday as well.

Instead of giving you viewer guides to preview the entirety of the Tournament, we’ll be giving you daily content outlining what we think is the biggest storyline, game or player to watch in every bracket across women’s basketball. Think of it as a combination of a preview and a watch guide.

Best of all, this content is 100% free for everyone in service of growing the game and giving you a chance to find the best hoops the sport has to offer. Let’s get to it!

One Big Thing In The…

Atlantic 10 Championship - 1st Round

The A-10 Conference Tournament has been an absolute bloodbath in past years. Last year’s semifinal included the 1, 5, 6 and 7 seeds. The prior two years, the 3rd seed in the tournament stole a bid. The year before those, in 2021, the final featured fifth seeded VCU vs. seven seed UMass. What I’m trying to tell you is that this bracket is a shit show and there’s a chance you could see a team in the first round cause some trouble for a higher seeded team in the next round. Don’t believe me? Look no further than 2022, when 12 seed George Washington beat La Salle on the second day of games. So even though these games don’t like all that interesting on paper, they will definitely be competitive and can even lead to some intriguing upsets a bit down the road…

ACC Tournament - 1st Round

The biggest thing in the opening round is that Stanford vs. Clemson matchup at 6:30 PM ET on the ACC Network. In many ways, it feels like two first year coaches with two very different vibes heading into Tournament time. Shawn Poppie’s Tigers feel like they’re playing with some house money and, despite a 13-16 record, I can see the long term vision of what he’s building in South Carolina. It’s clear they need some dynamic scorers to help them in the portal but given the roster turnover this year, I don’t think they’ll have that issue. Not to mention this matchup went Clemson’s way the first time. Both teams have some high profile wins in spite of their unremarkable records and Stanford has had to play most of the year without their true point guard Talana Lepolo. It’s been 36 years since an NCAA Tournament has been played without the Cardinal and that’s not a mark Kate Paye wants to have on her resume in just her first year taking over for Tara Vanderveer. So yeah, a lot on the line in this one. Stanford is right on the bubble and a loss here could bump them off and snap the longest active Tournament streak in women’s college basketball.

Big 12 Championship - 1st Round

Are we getting to the end of the line of the Natasha Adair experience at Arizona State? It sure feels that way. Especially when you contrast her tenure in Tempe with the coach opposite her in Kansas City. Katrina Merryweather has shown year over year improvement — going from 5-13 in Big 12 play in 2023-2024 to 7-11 this year — and while there is still a ways to go, there’s something to hold on to that the arrow is trending up. Adair’s record at Arizona State is currently 27-58 but the real concern is the 6-44 conference record across the Pac-12 and Big 12. The Sun Devils defense is the one of the worst in the country, ranked 345th out of 353. They lost several important in-state matchups to Arizona and Grand Canyon. The latter is important given the fact that both are based in effectively the same metro area. Much like Stanford vs. Clemson, this feels like a game of two divergent program trajectories and it’s definitely worth keeping tabs on throughout the day.

Big Ten Tournament - 1st Round

We’ve got bubble battles! In what are some of the most consequential games for NCAA Tournament resumes of the day, the Big Ten has some matchups with stakes in their first round. Washington was able to beat an Elisa Mevius-less Oregon team (which, that’s a brutal injury to have right before March starts) and help pad their bubble resume. The Huskies, Minnesota, Nebraska and Iowa are all operating in a similar place as it pertains to March Madness selection. An upset or a bad loss from any of them could alter seedings and discussions about them, especially if we get some mid-major bid stealers. Take the Atlantic-10, for instance, who have two programs in the NCAA NET Top 50. If George Mason wins the bracket, Richmond still likely gets in as an at-large. That means one of these Big Ten teams might get bounced out, making these first round games all the more important. If you want to watch conference matchups that you know could be the difference between competing in March Madness and staying at home, these are the games for you.

Big South Championship - 1st Round

There isn’t much meat on the bone in the Big South with just one game on tap and between two of their lowest finishers: Presbyterian and UNC Asheville. Both these teams split games in the regular season so, at the very least, we are guaranteed a rubber match. I’m leaning towards the Blue Hose — just a wild nickname for an athletic program — and their diamond-in-the-rough JUCO find Kishyah Anderson to win this one. Anderson was a star for Yavapai College in Arizona before finding her way to Presbyterian. Expect them to feed her in this one and build off her 40 point performance in the regular season finale against Gardner-Webb. Might not be the best one to watch but maybe we get an interesting ending, if nothing else. That’s what March is about anyway!

OVC Championship - 1st Round

So there’s two teams here that I’m watching as potential Tournament spoilers: Southern Indiana and Western Indiana. The former has a shot to make some noise deep into the OVC bracket while the latter might just spoil someone’s day. Western Illinois has a couple of really interesting upsets over Lindenwood and Eastern Illinois, who both finished in the top four of the conference. Amazingly, that win over Lindenwood helped pave the way for Tennessee Tech to win the conference outright. WIU plays UT-Martin in the first round. Southern Indiana, mind you, won this league both ways last year but is still reclassifying to Division I and was thus ineligible for March Madness. The same is true this year but it doesn’t mean the Screaming Eagles can’t make noise. This is a team tht nearly knocked off Indiana in Bloomington and also has wins against the cream of this conference. Of course, for either SIU or WIU to be able to cause some problems for higher seeds, they need to win their first round games.

SEC Tournament - 1st Round

I think Sam Purcell is safe from being on the SEC hot seat but there are a few others in the league that could be coaching for their jobs on Wednesday. Joni Taylor’s current record at Texas A&M is 38-51 over 3 years with an 11-37 mark in Southeastern Conference play. That’s a far cry from Gary Blair’s 444-184 record in the SEC which came with annual NCAA Tournament trips. I’m not sure who is more at risk here: Taylor, Arkansas’ Mike Neighbors or Georgia’s Katie Abrahamson-Henderson. There’s multiple games here that feel consequential for the coaching carousel and the manner in which these teams lose could play a factor in what their respective athletic directors decide to do.

Summit League Championship - 1st Round

We’ve got just one Summit League matchup in the first round on Wednesday and I do wonder about Doshia Woods’ status at the University of Denver. In five years at the helm, the Pioneers have never won over 12 games in a season. There’s been upward movement in Summit League play and some of these OOC schedules do skew records for mid-major coaches. If your athletic department is dependent on buy-games to help fund your program, there’s a chance you’ll be offered up as cannon fodder for top end teams. But that doesn’t seem to be the case here. You can’t lose to teams like Colorado Christian while watching a brand new Division I school (St. Thomas (MN)) enter the league and immediately lap you. I expect Omaha to win this game walking away as we prepare to see if anyone can put a scare into South Dakota State in the later rounds of this Tournament.