The SEC has placed a team in 18 of the 20 women's Final Fours. Long Beach State has been there twice. Cheyney -- whoever and wherever that is -- has played in a pair. All of which is more Final Fours than any team from the Big 12 has attended since the league formed in 1994. That would be zero.

The Midwest's dust-bowl drought should end this month. As many as seven Big 12 teams -- Oklahoma, Baylor, Iowa State, Colorado, Texas, Kansas State and Texas Tech -- could finish in the top 16, ensuring critical home first- and second-round Tourney games. Since more than 80% of subregional hosts make the third round, the mob of Big 12 squads almost has to mean at least one ticket to San Antonio. And when they get there ... "Whomever we play in the Tourney," says Iowa State's Bill Fennelly, "we've played a similar quality team two or three times already. We know we're ready to play the best."

Friend: The Terps can't do without Dixon Kirkpatrick: Gooden & Collison lead the Jayhawks Forde: Tough defense is the standard in Con-USA Liang: Haslem is comes up big for the Gators. Burton: Don't question Duke's toughness Feldman: Sampson's teaching are getting through Hockensmith: Dickau knows how to finish Wojciechowski: Johnson makes or breaks the Illini Thamel: UConn women are more than their starters Hodes: Look out for the women of the Big 12 Hodes: Lady Cardinals believe in Magic

How good is this conference, really? All but three of its teams have beaten a top-10 foe; eighth-place Oklahoma State has taken out three of them. Tenth-place Texas A&M beat Texas, which then beat Tennessee in Knoxville 10 days later. Most revealing, the Big 12 leads D1 in non-conference winning percentage (78.6%), including a 6-4 mark against the bar-setting SEC. "Playing these close games every night has prepared us for the Tourney," says K-State frosh PG Megan Mahoney, who in one year has upgraded a 2-14 league dust bunny into a serious final-weekend threat.

The Big 12 boasts an overstock of down-and-dirty players made for March. There's 6'1" Texas C Stacy Stephens, who averaged 14.7 ppg and 9.8 rpg despite routinely facing defenders three inches taller. Baylor has its own version of thunder and lightning: bruising PF Danielle Crockrom (17.6 ppg, 9.3 rpg) and cat-quick PG Sheila Lambert (19.9 ppg, 4.5 rpg). Texas Tech SG Jia Perkins grabs five boards a game to go along with her team-high 16 points. She's 5'8". Oklahoma PG Stacey Dales (16.7 ppg, 5 rpg, 4 apg) is a matchup monkey wrench who, at 6'1", can go inside and out. And Iowa State C Angie Welle (20.3 ppg, 11 rpg) leads all of D1 in field-goal shooting (67.2%). "This is definitely the toughest conference," Stephens says. "Every team is out there hustling and fighting and scrapping for everything."

Yup, looks like rain.

This article appears in the March 18 issue of ESPN The Magazine.