The field is set for the 2025 NCAA Division I women’s basketball tournament, and picking the winner seems to be a trickier prediction each year.
While the University of Connecticut dominated college women’s hoops for years, the Huskies haven’t won the championship since 2016, although they’ve stayed a top team. In fact, over the past eight years, five different teams have won it all (with one year cancelled because of Covid). Only South Carolina has repeated.
After looking practically inevitable for last year’s championship following an undefeated run through the season, this year South Carolina has lost three games. UCLA ended its regular season and conference tournament with the best record in DI with only two losses and an overall 1 seed for the tournament.
Going into March Madness, at least five teams have a really good shot at the title, and another five could make an only slightly surprising run at the championship. And the next 10 aren’t that far removed with a well-placed upset or two.
The last decade has seen an incredible rise in parity—and popularity—in NCAA women’s basketball. University of Southern California head coach Linday Gottlieb said, “Parity has been growing throughout our sport in recent years. I think we’re seeing players believe they can go to a number of different schools and make an impact and have the experience they want. It’s not just one or two schools that give them an option to win anymore, and I think we’re seeing that play out on the national stage.”
So, what’s changed over the past few decades? What’s driving the parity we see at this moment in NCAA women’s basketball?
Title IX
The greatest driver of improvement, parity, and popularity in college women’s basketball is Title IX. This 1972 landmark legislation required equity in education. While the bill’s authors were thinking primarily of the classroom, the law’s most profound effects may be in school sports. Prior to Title IX, schools invested few resources in women’s sports, and most schools didn’t embrace Title IX with enthusiasm. Nonetheless, as girls and women used the law to force change, opportunities for participation opened up, and girls and women stepped in to compete.
More Resources
Title IX required equitable investment in women’s sports, and, as resources became available, coaching and playing improved. Schools have invested in better facilities, coaches’ salaries, scholarships, academic support, uniforms, food, and travel. Still a 2022 Women’s Sports Foundation report found “gross gender inequities across all college divisions, including disproportionately more athletic opportunities provided to men athletes and a shortfall in the investment of resources in women’s athletic programs such as dollars allocated for athletic scholarships, recruiting, and coach compensation.”
Better Prepared Athletes
The impact of Title IX on K-12 sports has meant that young athletes have had more opportunity to develop their skills than did their predecessors. While women are slightly bigger than they were a few decades ago, the real change in bodies and skills has come from the required investment in girls and women’s sports. In elementary and high school girls have more access to equipment, training, and better coaching than they did before Title IX. So today’s players are faster, better ball handlers, and better shooters.
Better Coaches
As Title IX has required investment in women’s sports, coaching has improved as the sports has been able to attract better prepared and more expert coaches. A number of elite coaches—Pat Summitt, Tara VanDerveer, Geno Auriemma, and Dawn Staley, for example—have demonstrated the possibilities for women’s coaches, encouraging other coaches to aspire to their level of excellence. Additionally, coaching techniques have evolved to focus on tactics like scouting, analytics, and player development.
Player Development
As the college women’s game has changed to be more athletic and more physical, coaches have focused more on player development. They recruit players whose profiles demonstrate the athletic prowess, physical build, game skills, and basketball know-how to play at the DI level. Then, most teams have an entire squad of experts in each of these areas who work with players to continue to develop in these areas. Again, because of Title IX, women players now have greater access to athletic trainers, specialized assistant coaches, sports psychologists, team doctors, and weight rooms, and training tables.
Increased Interest
As play has improved and more teams have excelled, fan interest has increased dramatically. Breakout superstars like A’ja Wilson, Caitlin Clark, Angel Reese, and Juju Watkins have drawn fans to the game with their exceptional skills and exciting play. Player engagement with fans through social media and NIL deals have also brought in new fans. Viewership for the 2024 championship game was up more than 90% over 2023 and more than 288% over 2022. Nearly 19 million people watched that game. During the final five minutes of the game, viewership peaked at 24.1 million people.
Increased Visibility
Increased interest has led to increased visibility, and increased visibility has led to increased interest. Many more women’s games are now televised and streamed, and major advertisers have signed on to support women’s basketball. Until 2020, ESPN, which aired the women’s tournament, did not show the first two rounds in their entirety, relying instead on whiparound coverage that showed parts of games. In 2022, the NCAA finally allowed the women’s tournament to use the March Madness branding which helped elevate visibility. NIL brand deals with local and national companies have raised exposure and recognition for many players.
More Options
As more and more schools develop winning programs, top players have more options for where they might play. So instead of having to choose between the two or three top programs that might win a championship, they can also consider things like location, academic programs, and player benefits and still find a team that can make a championship run.
The transfer portal has also given students more options to choose places that work best for them based on the myriad considerations that matter to them individually. When the Pac-12 conference fell apart last year, Oregon State University’s top players, coming off a trip to the Elite 8 and a narrow 12-point loss to eventual champion South Carolina, rather than stay and play in the West Coast Conference, used the transfer portal to land at other top schools, including Southern California, UCLA, Texas Christian, and Oklahoma.
Data Analytics
Coaches’ use of data analytics has improved play as coaches have been able to tailor training for players, develop game strategies, and improve opponent scouting. Data analytics allow coaches to pinpoint players’ strengths and weakness, track their progress, and plan training accordingly. Data analytics can also help in scouting opponents and building game strategies based on what coaches know about their own players and their opponents’ teams. Data analytics can also help with identifying potential recruits who can meet team needs.
Title IX’s potential to transform women’s sports still has not been realized. The current parity in college women’s basketball is only one example of what can happen as girls and women are giving opportunity to participate and resources to support their play.
While all of this helps us understand how we got to this moment of increased parity, none of it helps us figure out who’s really going to win the tournament this year. It does, however, suggest that we’re about to be treated to a lot of competitive games and outstanding play.