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NCAA WOMEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP MEDIA CONFERENCE

March 18, 2019

Rhonda Lundin Bennett

Indianapolis, Indiana

THE MODERATOR: Greetings, and thanks to all who have joined us for tonight's call. Earlier tonight the NCAA Division I Women's Basketball Committee unveiled the 64-team bracket for the 2019 NCAA Division I Women's Basketball Championship.

First round play will begin at 16 sites on March 22 and 23, followed by second round play March 24 and 25, and regional action March 29 through April 1st in Albany, Chicago, Greensboro and Portland. The four regional winners will then advance to play in the 2019 NCAA Women's Final Four to be held April 5 and 7 in Amalie Arena in Tampa.

RHONDA LUNDIN BENNETT: I'd like to thank all of our committee members for the countless hours they spent on this process this season. In total we watched over 1,200 games in preparation for selections. I'd also like to thank the media, those of you on the call, for covering women's basketball throughout the season as well as the coverage you're going to give us in the upcoming championship.

The committee brought into the process knowledge gained through watching games, seeking input from various groups including the coaches, and reviewing extensive team data. We believe we have put together a bracket that will result in a compelling 2019 NCAA Division I championship that begins this week, continuing until we crown a national champion on April 7 at Amalie Arena in Tampa at the 2019 Women's Final Four. Let the games begin.

Q. I'm curious how much geography played into things. Just looking at the bracket quickly, it seems like you have a bunch of teams that are in the same area that could drive or make it easy to the regionals. Like you have DePaul, Notre Dame, Iowa State and Marquette could all potentially be in Chicago and you have NC State and South Carolina that could be in Greensboro. How much did that help you guys having teams that could be there potentially?
RHONDA LUNDIN BENNETT: Well, when we talk about bracketing, we are trying to balance that competitive equity along with geography, accessibility for fans, and mode of transportation, which means flights versus drives. So it is certainly something that we look at and something that we're trying to just make great match-ups, so for both the student-athlete experience, so they can be in arenas playing in front of a lot of fans, as well as our fans being able to watch their favorite teams play.

Q. Talk about how tough this year was. You've been on the committee for a while, just discerning who the top teams were and obviously also who the bottom teams were, it seems it's sort of splitting hairs where some of these teams go for deciding like the 1 seeds and who was the last four in.
RHONDA LUNDIN BENNETT: It was. We talked about the parity in the game increasing every year, and I think this year it was better than it ever has been. It was very difficult. We had a lot of discussion, considerable discussion about a lot of lines in the seeding as well as the teams that would get into the field.

Q. I was wondering what ultimately put Tennessee over the top to one of those final spots over, say an Arkansas or an Ohio, and also obviously their brand name, their status as the only team to have been to every tournament, how much did that come up if at all during the selection process?
RHONDA LUNDIN BENNETT: Well, thank you for the question. I'll start with the brand, and the brand doesn't play any role in our selections. We start over every year, and we really do look at a team's body of work in the current year, so past tournament experience, past history doesn't play any impact for our decision making.

For Tennessee, the things that were the determining factors for getting them into the field were their significant wins. They had five wins versus top-50 teams. They also had a very strong strength of schedule of 31, as well as the strength of their conference. We also looked at their non-conference schedule and their non-conference results were 11 and 2, so those were some of the factors that determined Tennessee getting into the field.

Q. Quick question for you on the 1 seeds; what was it about Louisville that put them over the top as a 1 seed? I know there was considerable discussion about them potentially being a 2 after the loss to Notre Dame.
RHONDA LUNDIN BENNETT: Yeah, thank you for the question. I think the things that we looked at with Louisville that were very strong were their RPI and their strength of schedule. Their RPI was 3, their strength of schedule was 6. They also had a win over UConn, a win over NC State. They were 7-3 in the top-25, so they had a lot of very significant wins.

Q. Can you name some of the teams that you were looking at besides them for that No. 1 seed line?
RHONDA LUNDIN BENNETT: UConn was definitely someone that we were considering for that No. 1 line, but we did have considerable discussion making sure that we had the right 1s and the right 2s.

Q. As you were finishing out the bracket and putting in the at-large, which teams was there a discussion or a struggle with trying to make it all work as far as the regions, the pods, after coming from a multiple-team league?
RHONDA LUNDIN BENNETT: I don't really understand your question. Could you --

Q. Yes. What I was asking was, on the conferences that had multiple teams, which were the teams toward the bottom, bottom of the bracket as you were finishing out that you were struggling with to make match to where they wouldn't be in the same -- the second or the third game of the tournament.
RHONDA LUNDIN BENNETT: So you're asking about our last four teams in?

Q. Right.
RHONDA LUNDIN BENNETT: Those were Auburn, Indiana, Tennessee and UCF, and then our first four out were Arkansas, James Madison, Ohio and TCU.

Q. Talk a little bit about the process of getting to those and how many were in the discussion at that particular point. I know it did take a lot of time for the committee to come down with those four in, four out.
RHONDA LUNDIN BENNETT: Yeah, we had considerable discussion about who those last teams into the tournament were, and at the time when you're talking about getting a team into the tournament, you're talking about their body of work. So there's a lot of different things that you're comparing and taking into account those eight teams and trying to decide -- they had good things about their resume and they have some not so good things about their resume, so really just trying to weigh, does the good outweigh the things that aren't as good and make the decisions to get the right teams into the field.

Q. I guess what it boils down to is someone at ESPN kind of leaked out the bracket. When you have situations like that, how much is there a scramble to get up to speed and make everything fall into place as far as timing and letting all the teams know, especially the AQ's that you're about ready to start a lot sooner than you wanted to?
RHONDA LUNDIN BENNETT: Yeah, so there was a technical error at ESPN. It was unfortunate, but at the time we made the best of it. We found out immediately and worked with our partners and came up with a solution that would get the bracket out officially in the best way possible. We're just looking forward to 63 great games culminating with the Women's Final Four in Tampa bay.

Q. You took a question about the early reveal of the brackets. I know it sent off a frenzy across the country in terms of schools having official watch parties. How do you think that affected kind of the day and the announcement of what's usually kind of a celebration in terms of parties on campuses?
RHONDA LUNDIN BENNETT: Thank you for the question. I think the best way to answer it is that we did the best that we could knowing what had happened to make it a great student-athlete experience. We did have the early show on ESPN officially revealing the bracket, and then we also had the later show giving teams that had watch parties the opportunity to still have that watch party experience with ESPN showing their name, showing their team celebrating.

Q. With the South Dakota women I was curious what factors went into their seeding as No. 8 and what qualified them also for an at-large bid?
RHONDA LUNDIN BENNETT: Well, thank you for the question. I think some of the things that we were looking at with South Dakota was their overall record, their 28-5 overall record. Within their conference they were 16-3. They also had 10 non-conference wins. They also lost in their conference tournament championship to South Dakota State, a team that they had played very closely throughout the year, so those are some of the things that we were looking at with South Dakota.

Q. How much did that second loss to SDSU in the conference championship ding them in terms of their seeding?
RHONDA LUNDIN BENNETT: You know, I think it's a factor. It's hard to gauge how much -- to use your word, dinged them. They certainly had a strong team. They got to the championship game of their conference tournament. We had been watching them all year. That wasn't the first time we had seen them play, so we had that eye test, and we really had a good understanding of what South Dakota and South Dakota State were all about when we got to that point.

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