Will South Carolina ride their undefeated season to a championship? Can Caitlin Clark and Iowa escape a tough Albany 2 region? The picks are in.
March Madness is finally upon us and on paper, the NCAA women’s tournament is primed for quite a bit of drama.
South Carolina leads the Albany 1 region as the No. 1 seed, with the Iowa Hawkeyes taking the top spot in the Albany 2 region. But it won’t be an easy road for Caitlin Clark & Co., who could come up against the defending champion LSU Tigers, and a pair of battle-tested Pac-12 teams in the Colorado Buffaloes and UCLA Bruins if the Hawkeyes want to return to the Final Four.
In the Portland regions, the USC Trojans and the Texas Longhorns are the No. 1 seeds and both are poised to make deep runs, but the No. 2 seeds Stanford Cardinal and Ohio State Buckeyes won’t make that simple. And don’t forget the three-seed UConn Huskies. This squad has been hit with quite the injury bug this season, including a season-ending ACL tear for Azzi Fudd. Despite a depleted lineup, seniors Paige Bueckers and Aaliyah Edwards have shined with the added pressure and both have plenty of experience with deep runs in the tournament (Final Four in 2021 and title game in ’22).
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So who will come away victorious? While much of the national spotlight has shone on the Hawkeyes and Clark as she broke record after record this season, our writers and editors are all eyeing a different—though familiar—team to win it all.
Baccellieri’s 2024 champion: South Carolina. I spent quite a bit of time mulling it over: Is there any way to justify picking against South Carolina? And I don’t believe there is. This squad is simply too deep, too talented, too good to take anyone else, in my book.
Brennan’s 2024 champion: South Carolina. The Gamecocks are undefeated for a reason. They are stacked with talent (headlined by Kamilla Cardoso), they’re deep and they have a seasoned coach in Dawn Staley. On top of all that, this year’s squad is not as easy to game plan against as last year’s team revealed itself to be. Expect Staley & Co. to be cutting down the nets when all is said and done.
Swinton’s 2024 champion: South Carolina. The Gamecocks have some tough competition waiting on the other side of the bracket if they reach the title game, including LSU, which they recently defeated amid tension in the SEC title game, and Iowa, which knocked them out of the tournament last year behind Clark’s 41 points. South Carolina will have to be disciplined to get to that point, but it has the power on both ends to become the first NCAA women’s basketball team to go undefeated since the 2015–16 UConn squad and grab a second championship in three years.
Kuwana’s 2024 champion: South Carolina. It only feels right that this season of college basketball will end with Clark in the Final Four. For her sake, it would be awesome to see Iowa win it all … but South Carolina’s consistency and development—even after losing five starters from last year’s championship team—is too hard to count out. Staley is the ultimate game engineer, and her team’s ability to learn from and improve upon wins, not losses, will make all the difference in this year’s tournament.
