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2024 NCAA Division I women's basketball tournament

The 2024 NCAA Division I women's basketball tournament was a 68-team single-elimination tournament to determine the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I college basketball national champion for the 2023–24 NCAA Division I women's basketball season. The 42nd edition of the tournament began on March 20, 2024, and concluded with the championship game on April 7, 2024 at Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse in Cleveland, Ohio.

This is the most recent appearance for Stanford Cardinal who made 32 appearances before missing the tournament in 2025.

Big South champion Presbyterian, Southland champion Texas A&M–Corpus Christi, WAC champion California Baptist and at-large bid Columbia all made their NCAA tournament debuts. Additionally, Big Sky champion Eastern Washington made its second-ever appearance and first since 1987, Big West champion UC Irvine made its first appearance since 1995 and Sun Belt champion Marshall made its first appearance since 1997. In the championship game, Iowa returned for their second straight appearance while South Carolina entered their third championship game in seven years and became the tenth team in Division I women's tournament history to finish an undefeated season at 38–0.

This was the first time where the top #1 seed won both the Men's & Women's NCAA Tournament since 2012.

Tournament procedure

A total of 68 teams participated in the 2024 tournament, consisting of the 32 conference champions, and 36 "at-large" bids that were determined by the NCAA Selection Committee. The last four at-large teams and teams seeded 65 through 68 overall competed in First Four games, whose winners advanced to the 64-team first round.

2024 NCAA Tournament schedule and venues

The first two rounds, also referred to as the subregionals, were played at the sites of the top 16 seeds.

First Four

  • March 20–21
  • Four of the campuses seeded in the Top 16

Subregionals (First and Second Rounds)

Regional Semifinals and Finals (Sweet Sixteen and Elite Eight)

National Semifinals and Championship (Final Four and Championship)

Cleveland hosted the women's Final Four for the second time; the first was in 2007.

Qualification and selection of teams

Automatic qualifiers

The following teams automatically qualified for the 2024 NCAA field by virtue of winning their conference's tournament.

Bids by state

The sixty-eight teams came from thirty-four states.

Bids by conference

Thirty-two conferences earned an automatic bid. In nineteen cases, the automatic bid was the only representative from the conference. Thirty-six additional at-large teams were selected from twelve of the conferences.

<span id="RegionSeeds">Seeds</span>

<section begin="RegionSeeds" /> The tournament seeds and regions were determined through the NCAA basketball tournament selection process and were published by the selection committee after the brackets were released on March 17.

<nowiki>*</nowiki>See First Four<br/> Source: <section end="RegionSeeds" />

Tournament bracket

All times are listed in Eastern Daylight Time ()

First Four

The First Four games involve eight teams: the four lowest-seeded automatic qualifiers and the four lowest-seeded at-large teams.

Albany regional 1 – Albany, NY

Albany regional 1 final

Albany regional 1 all-tournament team

Portland regional 4 – Portland, OR

Portland 4 regional final

Portland 4 regional all-tournament team

Albany regional 2 – Albany, New York

Albany regional 2 final

Albany regional 2 all-tournament team

Portland regional 3 – Portland, Oregon

Portland regional 3 final

Portland regional 3 all-tournament team

Final Four – Cleveland, Ohio

National semifinals

National championship

Final Four all-tournament team

Record by conference

  • The FF, R64, R32, S16, E8, F4, CG, and NC columns indicate how many teams from each conference were in the first four, round of 64 (first round), round of 32 (second round), Sweet 16, Elite Eight, Final Four, championship game, and national champion, respectively.

Game summaries and tournament notes

Tournament upsets

Per the NCAA, an upset occurs "when the losing team in an NCAA tournament game was seeded at least five seed lines better than the winning team."

Tournament records

Game officials

Media coverage

Most watched tournament games

The Albany 2 regional final between Iowa and LSU, a rematch of the previous year's national championship game drew the largest audience ever for a women's college basketball game as well as the most watched college basketball game in the 45-year history of ESPN. The record would last only a few days, as Iowa's national semifinal match with Connecticut averaged the most viewers for a basketball game at any level on ESPN. The Championship game again broke this record, with it becoming the most watched basketball game (including the NBA) since 2019 and the most watched basketball game to air outside of prime-time since the Fab Five played in the men's Final Four in 1992.

Television

ESPN broadcast each game of the tournament across either ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, ESPNEWS, or ABC. For the second consecutive season, the national championship game aired on ABC.

ESPN's The Pat McAfee Show broadcast live from Iowa City for the Iowa Hawkeyes' first-round game. ESPN provided Megacast coverage during the Final Four and national championship games, with the Bird & Taurasi Show alternate broadcast with Sue Bird and Diana Taurasi returning on ESPN2 and ESPN during the Final Four and national championship respectively, and the "Beyond the Rim" (additional statistics) and rail cam feeds available on ESPN+.

Studio host and analysts

  • Elle Duncan (host) (first four, first/second rounds, regionals, Final Four, and national championship)
  • Kelsey Riggs (host) (first/second rounds)
  • Rebecca Lobo (analyst) (first four, and first/second rounds)
  • Andraya Carter (analyst) (first four, first/second rounds, regionals, Final Four and national championship)
  • Chiney Ogwumike (analyst) (first/second rounds, regionals, Final Four and national championship)
  • Carolyn Peck (analyst) (Final Four and national championship)
  • Nikki Fargas (analyst) (first/second rounds)
  • Aliyah Boston (analyst) (Final Four and national championship)
  • Lisa Mattingly (rules analyst) (first four, first/second rounds, regionals, Final Four, and national championship)
  • Denny Meyer (rules analyst) (Final Four and national championship)

Commentary teams

First Four

First & second rounds Friday/Sunday (Subregionals)

  • Courtney Lyle and Carolyn Peck – Columbia, South Carolina
  • Jason Ross Jr. and Aja Ellison – Corvallis, Oregon
  • Tiffany Greene and Jimmy Dykes – Austin, Texas
  • Roy Philpott and Brooke Weisbrod – Stanford, California
  • Brenda VanLengen and Holly Warlick – Manhattan, Kansas
  • Dave O'Brien and Christy Thomaskutty – Baton Rouge, Louisiana
  • Jay Alter and Kelly Gramlich – Blacksburg, Virginia
  • Matt Schumacker and Meghan McKeown – Columbus, Ohio

First & second rounds Saturday/Monday (Subregionals)

  • Angel Gray and Andrea Lloyd-Curry – Bloomington, Indiana
  • Sam Gore and Tamika Catchings – Notre Dame, Indiana
  • Ann Schatz and Mike Thibault – Spokane, Washington
  • Eric Frede and Steffi Sorensen – Raleigh, North Carolina
  • Beth Mowins, Stephanie White, and Holly Rowe – Iowa City, Iowa
  • Kevin Fitzgerald and Kim Adams – Los Angeles, California (UCLA)
  • Elise Woodward and Mary Murphy – Los Angeles, California (USC)
  • Pam Ward and Christy Winters-Scott – Storrs, Connecticut

Regionals (Sweet 16 and Elite Eight)

  • Pam Ward, Stephanie White, and Holly Rowe – Albany, New York (Regional 1 – Sweet 16 games only)
  • Courtney Lyle, Carolyn Peck, and Brooke Weisbrod – Portland, Oregon (Regional 4)
  • Ryan Ruocco, Rebecca Lobo, and Holly Rowe – Albany, New York (Regional 2 – Sweet 16/Regionals 1 & 2 – Elite Eight)
  • Beth Mowins, Debbie Antonelli, and Angel Gray – Portland, Oregon (Regional 3)

Final Four and National Championship

  • Ryan Ruocco, Rebecca Lobo, and Holly Rowe – Cleveland, Ohio

Radio

Westwood One will serve as radio broadcaster of the tournament.

Regionals (Sweet 16 and Elite Eight)

  • Sam Neidermann and Isis Young – Albany, New York 1
  • Troy Clardy and Debbie Antonelli – Portland, Oregon 4
  • Lance Medow and Kim Adams – Albany, New York 2
  • Matt Chazanow and Krista Blunk – Portland, Oregon 3

Final Four and National Championship

  • Ryan Radtke, Debbie Antonelli, and Ros Gold-Onwude – Cleveland, Ohio

Racism Incident

On March 21st, 2024 the Utah Utes team and staff were arriving at a local restaurant in Coeur d'Alene, the location of their hotel, when they were jeered at and called racial slurs by locals. The team was relocated to Spokane for the remainder of their games.

See also

References

External links