Ivy League makes conference history with three women's NCAA Tournament bids
Women's basketball has been on the rise in the Ivy League for a decade and now the conference can boast three teams in the NCAA Tournament for the first-time ever.
Princeton got the run started when the Tigers were undefeated in 2015 heading into the NCAA Tournament. They won a first round game before falling to host Maryland in the second round. Princeton went on to win two more opening round games in 2022 and 2023.
Now the Tigers have company as a conference record three teams are participating in March Madness. Harvard, which made its own NCAA history by pulling off the only win by a women's 16-seed over a No. 1 in 1998, earned the automatic bid by knocking off Columbia in the conference tournament title game. The Crimson are making their first appearance since 2007 in the NCAAs.
The Lions earned an at-large bid for the second straight season — a rare feat for a non-power school. Princeton also got an at-large bid, giving the conference the fifth-most teams in the tournament behind the Power Four conferences.
'It's really huge for the conference, particularly in back-to-back years,' Ivy League executive director Robin Harris said of getting at-large bids. 'It shows the trajectory of Ivy League women's basketball and the fact we are a premiere women's basketball conference.'
The Ivy League men's programs have had success in the tournament over the last 15 years by winning eight games, but the conference has never gotten an at-large bid.
Now the Ivy is the first league outside the power conferences, Big East or American Athletic Conference to have three bids to the women's tournament since the Atlantic 10 did it in 2016.
The league has made waves this season that started with a big victory by Harvard at Indiana in November.
'We're thrilled, but we're not shocked or surprised,' Princeton coach Carla Berube said of the league's success. 'We know the level of basketball and how talented our student-athletes are. We're going about it the right way with our non-conference schedules.'
Harvard, Columbia and Princeton have been ranked in the top 50 of the women's NET ratings for nearly the entire season.
'For me its the consistency piece,' Columbia coach Megan Griffith said. 'This hasn't been a new discussion. There's more exposure around the league.'
Griffith knows the history of the conference better than nearly any other coach in the league. She starred as a player at Columbia from 2003-07 and then after spending four years as an assistant at Princeton, came back to take over as the head coach for the Lions.
'I'm proud of how far we've been able to come," she said. "I don't think this is where we end up."
The league's coaches have an email chain going and Berube said they are all cheering for each other.
'There's a great sense of pride. This league is now getting that national recognition,' she said. 'It's the league, but these three teams deserve to be in this tournament.'
___
AP March Madness: https://apnews.com/hub/march-madness Get poll alerts and updates on the AP Top 25 throughout the season. Sign up here.
Doug Feinberg, The Associated Press
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