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First Four launches March Madness 2024. Here's everything to know about women's teams.
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Date:2025-04-14 16:44:55
For the women, March Madness ramps up one day after the men with their own First Four matchups.
The expanded field is fairly new to the women's game, which started the First Four round in 2022. It was one of a handful of changes that the NCAA began making in the wake of a gender equity report showing vast disparities between the men's and women's basketball tournaments.
Unlike the men, who stage all four games in one place, the women play each game at a different location, picking four sites out of the top 16 national seeds.
Here is what you need to know about the women's teams in this year's First Four.
First Four teams for women's March Madness
- Arizona (17-15): Went into the Pac-12 tournament as the No. 7 seed and was eliminated by top-seeded USC in the conference quarterfinals.
- Auburn (20-11): Finished in a sixth-place tie with Mississippi State in the SEC and was routed by LSU in the conference quarterfinals.
- Columbia (23-6): Finished tied with Princeton for the top seed in the Ivy League before going on to beat the Tigers 75-58 in the conference championship game.
- Holy Cross (20-12): Was the top seed in the Patriot League and went on to win the conference championship against Boston University 61-55.
- Presbyterian (20-14): Finished in a tie for fourth place in the Big South, but went on to beat Radford in the conference title game.
- Sacred Heart (24-9): Only lost one game in the NEC and ran away with the conference championship. The Pioneers have won 15 consecutive games.
- UT Martin (16-16): Was one of three teams to finish in second place in the OVC and made it to the conference championship game before losing to top-seeded Southern Indiana.
- Vanderbilt (22-9): Finished the regular season as the No. 6 seed in the SEC tournament, where they were ousted by Florida in the first round.
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When is First Four for women?
The women's First Four will take place with two games on Wednesday, March 20 and two games on Thursday, March 21.
First Four games for women
Wednesday, March 20
- Sacred Heart (24-9) vs. Presbyterian (20-14), 7 p.m. ET on ESPNU. The winner will be the No. 16 seed in Albany Regional 1 and face No. 1 South Carolina.
- Vanderbilt (22-9) vs. Columbia (23-6), 9 p.m. ET on ESPNU. The winner will be the No. 12 seed in Portland Regional 3 and face No. 5 Baylor.
Thursday, March 21
- Auburn (20-11) vs. Arizona (17-15), 7 p.m. on ESPN2. The winner will be the No. 11 seed in Portland Regional 3 and face No. 6 Syracuse.
- Holy Cross (20-12) vs. UT Martin (16-16), 9 p.m. ET on ESPN2. The winner will be the No. 16 seed in Albany Regional 2 and face No. 1 Iowa.
Where is First Four for women?
The sites of the women's First Four games will be: Blacksburg, Virginia; Columbia, South Carolina; Storrs, Connecticut; and Peoria, Illinois.
How to watch women's First Four
The women's First Four games will be broadcast on ESPNU and ESPN2.
Have any First Four teams won the women's national championship?
No, in fact Mississippi State is the only team to ever win a first-round game after advancing out of the First Four. Last season the Bulldogs beat Creighton in the Round of 64 before losing to Notre Dame 53-48 in the second round.
USA TODAY Sports' Steve Gardner contributed to this report.
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