It’s that time of year again and we finally have a women’s March Madness bracket! I’m as excited as all of you and there’s a lot to dig into. This year has been one with a fair bit of parity in the women’s game, but the teams at the top have been very strong. No. 1 overall seed South Carolina is 32-0, while eight of the top 10 squads have five or fewer defeats. Factors like that make it tougher to pick Cinderella teams, but I’m going to try anyway. Below, I have my three most likely Cinderella candidates, or the lower seeds that I think have the potential to at least pull off an upset in the first round and keep on dancing.
No. 13 Fairfield Stags
For our first one, I’ll stay in-state with Fairfield. Though No. 13 seeds rarely overcome the odds to beat No. 4 seeds, there’s none I trust more to do so than the Stags. Fairfield hasn’t had the toughest schedule, but they have done wonders with it. They won their first two games with ease and faced off against Vanderbilt, who was tabbed as a No.12 seed on Selection Sunday. It was a game played in the Commodores’ favor for the most part as the home side led by double digits for most of the second half. However, down the stretch, Fairfield mounted a comeback, cutting the deficit to just one with a minute left before losing by three.
From there, the Stags didn’t look back, winning their next 29 games. And that is the winning streak they bring into the tournament. They do suffer by having a freshman as their best player in Meghan Andersen, but she’s helped by senior Janelle Brown, who has run the point. Half the battle is managing their opponent, Indiana. The Hoosiers have been great this season, only dropping five games. However, their fourth loss is perhaps the most encouraging from Fairfield’s perspective. They lost by 20 points at 14-15 Illinois, which is the sliver of hope Fairfield needs to beat them. Indiana has shown they can lose against teams who aren’t tournament-caliber squads and Fairfield has what it takes to send them packing early.
No. 11 Green Bay Phoenix
Green Bay was tested in a strong top of the Horizon League that could have very well sent two teams. They kicked their season off with a rough loss at Northern Iowa, but soon after struck gold with a win over No. 7 seed Creighton. They sustained a loss in their early season tournament semifinal to Maryland but were able to pick up third place over then-No. 22 Washington State, who is not in the NCAA Tournament field. They have two other bizarre losses, one to a poor DePaul squad and another against Oakland, a Horizon bottomfeeder. Otherwise, Green Bay generally took care of business, finishing 27-6.
They’re led by a well-rounded attack of scorers, with six players scoring between 7.1 and 13.4 points per game. The ringleader of this attack is Bailey Butler, who is towards the bottom of the rotation in terms of scoring but is the glue that holds them together. Teams that can hurt you from a lot of different angles can be tough to prepare for and are prime candidates for upsets. This is especially true when playing a team like Tennessee, who is having a down year. The Volunteers’ 1-8 record against the top 25 is weak and indicates they are vulnerable. Veteran guard Rickea Jackson will be looking to put an end to this conversation but needs help from her teammates to do so.
No. 12 Columbia
After being the first team out in last year’s tournament, Columbia put together another solid season and was rewarded with another NCAA Tournament berth. After losing more than half their scoring, the Lions got off to a rough start to the season with a 2-4 record. They dropped a game against a strong Stony Brook team and faltered at home against current No. 7 seed Duke by four. Columbia’s season took an especially rough turn when they lost a pair against Georgia and Florida in the Bahamas, which made it seem like their chances at an at-large bid were toast. Instead, they figured things out and won 21 of their next 23 games, including one of three against now No. 9 seed Princeton. Unfortunately for them, one of the two times they lost to the Tigers came in the Ivy League finals, seemingly banishing them to the NIT for another season.
Instead, the committee surprised everyone – including Columbia – and tabbed the Lions as one of the last two teams in the tournament. This means that they’ll have to beat Vanderbilt in the play-in game before they get a shot at No. 5 seed Baylor. Prior to their selection, Columbia coach Megan Griffith pleaded to the committee not to pick a 15-14 SEC team as an at-large selection over them. This description doesn’t exactly match Vandy’s profile, but has to be an extra motivating factor between the teams in the high-major versus mid-major battle.
The reason why Columbia is so well-equipped to beat the Commodores and the Bears is because of Abbey Hsu. The senior is the top assignment on every opposing team’s scouting report on a nightly basis, but still averages 20 points on 40% from deep. A player of her caliber alone gives them the chance to win, but they have a deep team with a mix of younger and older talent, where any one of five or six players could kill the opposition. There’s ultimately the chance that they don’t even get the chance to play Baylor, but if they do, the Lions could surprise many.