Women's Bracketology: 2023 NCAA tournament

By Charlie Creme Updated: 9/19/2023 at 9:00 a.m. ET

Perhaps the busiest offseason in women's college basketball history is nearly over. With the transfer portal transforming the sport and a long list of coaching changes occurring every spring, rosters now take months to fully form. But the 2023-24 campaign is a mere seven weeks away, and it's time to reflect on everything that has happened since April. Consider this the first step in your guide to Selection Sunday on March 17.

Bracket Watch

The changes since April's bracket begin at the top. LSU won the national championship -- and the offseason, with the additions of transfers Hailey Van Lith and Aneesah Morrow. Morrow's decision to leave DePaul for Baton Rouge pushed LSU past UConn for the top overall seed. UCLA and Ohio State bump conference rivals Utah and Iowa to claim the final two No. 1 seeds. That shift hints at how compelling the Pac-12 and Big Ten races will be, as those conferences lead the way with nine and eight bids, respectively.

On the Bubble

Last Four Byes

Last Four In

First Four Out

Next Four Out

68-Team Bracket

Albany 1

Baton Rouge

Stanford

Bloomington

Blacksburg

Portland 4

Columbus

Louisville

Oxford

Salt Lake City

Albany 2

Storrs

College Park

South Bend

Columbia

Portland 3

Los Angeles

Waco

Knoxville

Iowa City

Conference Breakdown

Conference

Team

Photo illo by ESPN Illustration, additional photos courtesy of Getty Images, Associated Press, Imagn, Icon Sportswire, EPA/Shutterstock

RULES

ESPN's Bracketology efforts are focused on projecting the NCAA tournament field just as we expect the NCAA Division I basketball committee to select the field in March. ESPN bracketologist Charlie Creme uses the same data points favored by the committee, including strength of schedule and other season-long indicators, including the NET and team-sheet data similar to what is available to the NCAA, in his projections of the field. Visit the NCAA's website for a fuller understanding of NCAA selection criteria.

64-Team Bracket

The 64-team bracket is the standard version of the NCAA tournament field that has been in place since 1994. If the 2021 field is comprised of 64 teams, there will be some key differences to past years, however.

The primary adjustment from a normal year is, of course, the playing of the entire NCAA tournament at a single site. This eliminates the need for geographical considerations in seeding. Additionally, there will be at least one fewer automatic qualifier this season, as the Ivy League's decision to forgo the 2020-21 season reduces the number of AQ entries to 31 for this season.

48-Team Bracket

In this projection, a condensed selection process would reduce the field by eight at-large teams and eight automatic qualifiers (the latter of which still receive a revenue unit). The top four seeds in each region would receive a bye into the second round, with four first-round games per region - 5 vs. 12, 6 vs. 11, 7 vs. 10 and 8 vs. 9.

16-Team Bracket

In this projection, the committee selects and seeds the 16 best available teams. There are no automatic qualifiers, although all non-competing conference champions receive the designated revenue unit.

To maintain some sense of national balance, conference participation is capped at four teams. And no region shall have more than one team from the same conference.