Women's Bracketology: 2026 NCAA tournament

By Charlie Creme Updated: 12/16/2025 at 8 a.m. ET

Mid-December means final exams and the lightest part of the season's schedule. But there is still plenty of movement in Bracketology: Louisville joined the top 16 and eight new teams entered the field. We continue to project the bracket every Tuesday through early January, when we update projections twice a week (Tuesday and Friday).

Bracket Watch

Despite the lighter schedule, the weekend included two big matchups that were very telling as to this season's power structure. UConn's blowout at USC and Texas' dismantling of Baylor in Fort Worth demonstrated that the gap between the very best teams in the country and the next tier is substantial. The Trojans and Bears figure to fight for top-16 spots all season, yet neither game was competitive. South Carolina, without third-leading scorer and top rebounder Madina Okot, also cruised to an easy win over Penn State. The combined margin of victory in those three games: 103 points. Not to take away the mystery in mid-December, but apart from LSU, there doesn't seem to be a challenge to the No. 1 seeds. UConn, Texas, South Carolina, UCLA and LSU have separated themselves. It would be shocking if four teams from that group aren't on the top line on Selection Sunday.

On the Bubble

Last Four Byes

Last Four In

First Four Out

Next Four Out

68-Team Bracket

Region 1 Fort Worth

Storrs

Iowa City

Ames

Norman

Region 4 Sacramento

Los Angeles

Chapel Hill

Lexington

Baton Rouge

Region 2 Fort Worth

Austin

Knoxville

College Park

Fort Worth

Region 3 Sacramento

Columbia

Louisville

Nashville

Ann Arbor

Conference Breakdown

Conference

Team

Photo illo by ESPN Illustration, additional photos courtesy of Getty Images, Associated Press, Imagn, Icon Sportswire, EPA/Shutterstock

RULES

ESPN's Bracketology efforts are focused on projecting the NCAA tournament field just as we expect the NCAA Division I basketball committee to select the field in March. ESPN bracketologist Charlie Creme uses the same data points favored by the committee, including strength of schedule and other season-long indicators, including the NET and team-sheet data similar to what is available to the NCAA, in his projections of the field. Visit the NCAA's website for a fuller understanding of NCAA selection criteria.

64-Team Bracket

The 64-team bracket is the standard version of the NCAA tournament field that has been in place since 1994. If the 2021 field is comprised of 64 teams, there will be some key differences to past years, however.

The primary adjustment from a normal year is, of course, the playing of the entire NCAA tournament at a single site. This eliminates the need for geographical considerations in seeding. Additionally, there will be at least one fewer automatic qualifier this season, as the Ivy League's decision to forgo the 2020-21 season reduces the number of AQ entries to 31 for this season.

48-Team Bracket

In this projection, a condensed selection process would reduce the field by eight at-large teams and eight automatic qualifiers (the latter of which still receive a revenue unit). The top four seeds in each region would receive a bye into the second round, with four first-round games per region - 5 vs. 12, 6 vs. 11, 7 vs. 10 and 8 vs. 9.

16-Team Bracket

In this projection, the committee selects and seeds the 16 best available teams. There are no automatic qualifiers, although all non-competing conference champions receive the designated revenue unit.

To maintain some sense of national balance, conference participation is capped at four teams. And no region shall have more than one team from the same conference.