Controversy and neutral sites: The evolution of hosting in women’s March Madness
One of the most consequential moments in women’s college basketball happened off the court.
During the 2021 edition of the women’s NCAA Tournament, then-Oregon center Sedona Prince posted a TikTok video highlighting the stark difference in resources provided to participating athletes in each tournament.
On the video captioned “it’s 2021 and we are still fighting for bits and pieces of equality,” Prince showed a single dumbbell tower, which the NCAA provided as the weight room for the women’s tournament, before showing footage of the men’s weight room — a large space full of equipment one might expect to see provided for March Madness.
It’s just one example in this decade alone of how the women’s tournament has received — and ultimately responded to — calls for equity between the men’s and women’s NCAA Tournaments, suggestions for a better experience for student-athletes and fans alike and concerns related to a global pandemic.
But it’s not a new phenomenon. Since its inaugural NCAA championship in 1982, the Division I women’s college basketball tournament format has been criticized, tinkered with and tailored alongside the sport’s skyrocketing popularity and growth.
When the First Four tips off Wednesday, marking the official start of March Madness, fragments of the original tournament structure dating back to the early 80s will be visible. But the Big Dance will also showcase the results and consequences of a bevvy of changes made to its bracket since 2002.
The 2021 tournament — during which Prince’s TikTok went viral — was played entirely in Texas, at arenas in San Antonio, Austin and San Marcos, due to restrictions related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
In the 2022 edition of March Madness — not-so-coincidentally the first official year that the women’s tournament could legally use the name, another positive shift stemming from Prince’s video and the subsequent NCAA gender equity review it spawned — the NCAA returned to its traditional, multi-site regional format.
For some, the unique setup of the first- and second-round games in the women’s tournament is a special twist, a point of pride for the top 16 overall seeds to have earned the right to host in the opening weekend.
But others call for a different approach, one similar to that of the men’s NCAA Tournament, where teams earning a spot in the field get sent to neutral sites for the opening rounds.
Kentucky coach Kenny Brooks is among the latter group.
Brooks and No. 5 seed Kentucky (23-10) will face No. 12 seed James Madison (26-8) at 2:30 p.m. ET on ESPNU on Saturday in the first round of this year’s NCAA Tournament.
On Selection Sunday, Brooks said he would prefer that the NCAA Tournament return to predetermined regional sites, as opposed to the current format re-established first in 2015, and then again in 2022 after a two-year COVID disruption. There was no tournament in 2020.
“I’ll be happy when the day comes that the NCAA goes back to the regional sites for women,” Brooks said. “I just think that I’ve done that once as a coach, and it was probably one of the best experiences that I had. When you can take the kids and you go to a neutral floor, and it just seemed like an event.”
As Brooks correctly noted after learning of No. 5 seed Kentucky’s fate — a road trip to Morgantown, the home of No. 4 seed West Virginia — the geographic setup of the women’s tournament has evolved over time, despite his particular concern serving as the standard for the majority of its iterations.
Beginning in 1982, and through the 2002 edition of the Big Dance, it was standard for the NCAA women’s basketball tournament to reward its top seeds with the offer of hosting privileges in the opening weekend. Beginning in the second weekend, the remaining 16 teams would descend upon four neutral sites before whichever destination city hosted the Final Four and National Championship games that season.
Beginning in 2003, the setup changed; no longer were the top seeds guaranteed a homecourt advantage in first- and second-round games. Instead, these sites were decided a year prior, and did not necessarily correspond to a program’s success that season. In 2003, for example, Toledo, UCLA and Washington hosted opening-weekend matchups despite not making the tournament themselves.
This model continued on for more than a decade. In 2014, the NCAA conducted a single-year experiment in which schools were allowed to host in the regional round.
That year, host institutions Louisville (a No. 4 seed), Nebraska (a No. 4 seed) and Stanford (a No. 2 seed) were thought to be in an advantageous position over the top-seeded teams in their respective regional. The fourth host school, Notre Dame, entered the 2014 tournament with an undefeated record and a No. 1 seed.
Louisville fell on its home floor in the regional Final to No. 4 Maryland, which beat No. 1 seed Tennessee in the regional semifinal.
Nebraska, playing its opening rounds in Los Angeles, did not reach the feared regional matchup with No. 1 Connecticut in Lincoln, Nebraska.
Stanford did advance to the Final Four out of the Stanford Regional, but it did so by defeating No. 4 North Carolina in the regional final; the Gamecocks lost to the Tar Heels in the round prior.
The 2014 national championship matchup between No. 1 seeds Notre Dame and UConn might have featured different teams had the controversial hosting experiment not happened, but it also may have played out precisely the same way. The Huskies never had the chance to face the hosting Cornhuskers, and the Fighting Irish could very well have reached the title game without the South Bend Regional.
In 2015, the NCAA championship committee returned to the original sub-regional format, as well as to neutral sites for the regional round. Anucha Browne, then the then-NCAA vice president of women’s basketball championships, said it was a net positive for student-athletes and the tournament.
“The committee heard the concerns from the coaching community in protecting neutrality at the regional rounds and acted accordingly,” Browne said. “In looking for ways to improve the student-athlete experience, the committee felt a move to neutral regional sites was in the best interest of the championship.”
One of the experiment’s most high-profile critics, longtime Notre Dame coach Muffet McGraw, celebrated the decision to return to neutral sites at the regional rounds.
‘’I’m so pleased to see the committee recognize the importance of neutral sites in order to preserve the integrity of the tournament,’’ McGraw said then. ‘’I believe they are as happy as the coaches are that we will be able to play on neutral courts for the regionals moving forward.’’
The change meant the women’s basketball tournament was restored to its traditional format. As from 1982-2002, the top seeds received hosting privileges for the opening weekend before moving to four neutral sites for regional semifinal and regional final games.
In its 2022 return, women’s March Madness operated the same way.
But ahead of the 2023 NCAA Tournament, the NCAA chose to reduce the number of regional sites from four to two, a “super regional” decision that will last through at least 2028.
Another controversial NCAA move, the choice was publicly criticized by UConn’s Geno Auriemma, who said “whoever came up with this super regional stuff — and I know who they are — ruined the game.”
Auriemma’s concerns were related to the continued inequality between the men’s and women’s tournaments — the men’s format continues to use the four-site regional round — as well as fans’ now-limited ability to travel to NCAA Tournament games and higher-seeded programs potentially being forced to travel farther for the regional round.
The former is exemplified this year by this year’s tournament draws of Auriemma’s Huskies and Dawn Staley’s South Carolina team. UConn, the top overall seed in the 2026 Big Dance, will play in the Fort Worth Regional, should the Huskies’ journey play out as expected.
The Gamecocks, the fourth and final No. 1 seed, will play their games in Sacramento, should they advance to the second weekend.
Regardless, both teams will play host to three tournament matchups this weekend, and their fan bases — should the bracket go chalk in Storrs, Connecticut, and Columbia, South Carolina — will likely still show up in Northern California come the second weekend.
As was the case during the 2014 experiment model, and in the post-COVID tournament years, a homecourt advantage certainly does not hurt a team, but it doesn’t guarantee a path forward to the Sweet 16, either.
In 2023, Brooks’ Virginia Tech team made program history by reaching the Final Four for the first time ever. The Hokies, one of two No. 1 seeds alongside South Carolina to reach the Final Four, started that journey hosting first- and second-round games hosted in Blacksburg, Virginia.
In each of the following years, Brooks’ teams achieved top 16 overall seeds — No. 4 Virginia Tech in 2024 and No. 4 Kentucky in 2025 — but failed to make it past the round of 32.
When, on Selection Sunday, Brooks idealized the return to “the regional sites for women,” a UK spokesperson clarified, he meant that his favorite tournament experiences came from that era of the NCAA Tournament, despite the fact that his teams never made a run.
Each of his three tournament experiences without hosting privileges awarded to the field’s top seeds came during his tenure at James Madison; in each of those years, the Dukes had a first-round exit.
In 2007, the No. 9 Dukes lost to No. 8 Pittsburgh in the first round. Coincidentally, the game took place in Pittsburgh, but the Panthers lost to eventual national champion and No. 1 seed Tennessee in the Round of 32.
In 2010, No. 9 James Madison played its opening-round game in Norfolk, Virginia, and lost 65-53 to No. 8 Temple. The Owls may have advanced to the second round in the Dukes’ home state, but got stomped, 90-36, by eventual national champion and No. 1 seed UConn in the round of 32.
In 2011, Brooks’ final brush with the format, the No. 11 Dukes again played in Virginia (this time in Charlottesville), and lost by 14 in the first round to No. 6 Oklahoma, which lost in the regional semifinal to eventual national runner-up and No. 2 seed Notre Dame.
Brooks may not love that the current structure of the NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament awards hosting privileges to the top 16 overall seeds in the field, but he and his team are still “looking forward to the opportunity to play.”
“We’ve been fortunate enough to host in the last couple of years,” Brooks said. “We fell a little bit short this year. We knew we had some injuries, we had some stuff to make up and some time to make up, and we’re just fortunate that we’re here. Our fans, it’s a little bit of a hike, but our fans could come if they wanted to. But we’re just looking forward to the opportunity to play.”
