Women's basketball top-16 reveal: South Carolina, Baylor, Louisville and Oregon are top seeds in first release

POSTED: February 4, 2020 -- 12:28 p.m. CT

If the season ended today, South Carolina, Baylor, Louisville and Oregon would occupy the No. 1 seed line of the 2020 championship bracket as the NCAA Division I Women's Basketball Committee made its first top-16 reveal on Monday night at halftime of the Oregon-UConn game on ESPN2.

UConn, Stanford, NC State and Maryland are currently No. 2 seeds. Teams rounding out the top-16 included Oregon State, Mississippi State, UCLA and Gonzaga on the three line, while Arizona, DePaul, Iowa and Northwestern were No. 4 seeds.

In addition, the committee provided region assignments for all 16 seeds, with South Carolina the No. 1 seed in the Greenville Region, Baylor currently the No. 1 seed in the Dallas Region, Louisville the No. 1 seed in the Fort Wayne Region and Oregon No. 1 in the Portland Region.

Baylor would be joined by Stanford, Gonzaga and Arizona in Dallas. The Fort Wayne Regional includes Louisville, UConn, Oregon State and Northwestern. In Greenville, South Carolina would be joined by NC State, UCLA and Iowa. The Portland Regional would include Oregon, Maryland, Mississippi State and DePaul.

The season has shown there is an increased parity and that was reflected in the difficulty that the committee had in identifying the top 16 seeds here in early February,” said Diane Turnham, chair of the Division I Women's Basketball Committee and senior associate athletic director and senior woman administrator at Middle Tennessee State University. "There are so many great games coming up in February that will be very telling before our next reveal in early March."

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"The early reveal of our top-16 seeds continues to serve as a way to build conversation around our game and to raise awareness and momentum for the coming championship," said Diane Turnham, chair of the Division I Women's Basketball Committee and senior associate athletic director at Middle Tennessee State University. "Members of the committee have watched hundreds of games and have had much team conversation already, so it will be interesting to see which teams emerge on Monday."

The first and second rounds of the 2020 NCAA Division I Women's Basketball Championship will be played March 20-23 on the home courts of the top 16 seeds. Regional action will take place March 27-30, with Dallas (Moody Coliseum) and Greenville, S.C. (Bon Secours Wellness Arena) hosting on March 27 and 29, while Fort Wayne, IN. (Allen County War Memorial Coliseum) and Portland (Moda Center) will host regional games on March 28 and 30. The 2020 Women's Final Four will be held April 3 and 5 at the Smoothie King Center in New Orleans.

In its continued commitment to the sport of women's college basketball, ESPN will air the entire 2020 Women's Final Four (semifinals and championship) in primetime on the flagship network. Additionally, the entire first and second rounds of the women's championship will be available nationally on ESPN’s television networks, eliminating regionalization.

For the latest Women’s Final Four information, visit ncaa.com/womensfinalfour.

NCAA Division I Women's Basketball Committee — Feb. 3 — Top-16 ranking *

2020 regional assignments

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