AP Top 25: As March looms, emotions and stakes ratchet up in an ultra-competitive SEC

The SEC is the conference of coach crashouts. 

First, it was Tennessee’s Kim Caldwell calling out “a lot of quit” in her squad’s loss to South Carolina, a blunt take that gained mass traction given the caliber of opponent. The second-year coach laid fairly similar claims the week prior in a loss to Mississippi State, and this week she walked onto the court during a stoppage to light into Talaysia Cooper. 

Texas’ Vic Schaefer followed suit, describing his Longhorns as “probably the softest team I’ve had in years” following an 86-70 loss to Vanderbilt on Thursday. 

And LSU’s Kim Mulkey, dressed to the occasion in a heart-laden pink suit, animatedly dressed down her team in a late-game huddle on Saturday night in primetime. “Who can guard Tessa [Johnson]?” she screamed. There was also the desperation timeout call in the third quarter that required assistants to hold her back. 

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It is all high theater. And understandable given the stakes. It’s not unfathomable that the SEC dominates the NCAA Tournament and lands multiple teams in the Final Four. That’s the expectation for these programs. 

“Good will get you fired,” Schaefer said on Sunday after edging Caldwell’s Lady Vols, 65-63, in Knoxville. “And so, for us, [it’s] trying to get our kids to be great because that’s what’s required at our schools.” 

Sunday’s slate capped another March-esque week in which more than half of the Associated Press Top 25 played each other on a single day. Of those seven ranked-on-ranked games, three were in the SEC. That doesn’t include the top-10 matchup of budding rivals LSU and South Carolina on Saturday night. 

The NCAA women’s basketball selection committee’s first top 16 reveal minutes before tipoff of South Carolina’s 79-72 win spotlighted the importance of these games — and winning them now, with it fresh on the minds of the 12-person committee. With as close as these SEC teams are one month from Selection Sunday, the pendulum can and will swing quickly. There is plenty of jockeying to ensure a better path to Phoenix, and leveling up to competition now sharpens the passage. 

Vanderbilt moved into the final 1-seed spot days after upsetting Texas, the presumed selection that held a case to usurp South Carolina on the line. Its 76-74 loss to then-unranked Georgia pushed it right back down the seed line, while giving the Bulldogs a signature victory. They’re back in the rankings at No. 24, after a brief one-week stay on Jan. 26 led by Dani Carnegie’s 29 points and game-securing free throw in the win.

Kentucky, too, is back in good graces with a 74-57 win over then-No. 14 Ole Miss as the other SEC upset of the day. The Wildcats’ resume is worthy of hosting duties as a top-16 seed, but they were not in the committee’s initial reveal. Ole Miss and Oklahoma, which backed up its spot in a 79-71 win over Alabama, were the final two teams into the field. The Rebels’ hold surely took a hit based on the result and the scoring gap. 

Tennessee is also vying for hosting duties. Its placement on the outside looking up could largely be attributed to exactly what Caldwell crashed out about. It’s not the loss to South Carolina that was the problem; it’s that they weren’t competitive, and it fed right into the committee’s first seeding last week. Ahead of the Texas game, Caldwell said the moment wasn’t flattering for her or the program, but at this point, the hope is they can look back at it as a turning point. Nearly taking out Texas is proof that they can be as competitive as they want to show themselves. 

“I think they got a wake-up call,” Caldwell said. “They’re awake now. We’re going to continue to be on them. You saw [Sunday] with some of the games being played, you got to show up every single night. It’s the toughest league in the country. You cannot take a night off against anyone. You gotta show up; you gotta play.” 

Which leads to a new section in the weekly poll ballot notebook. Now that the women’s selection committee released its first top 16 reveal, and with one month until Selection Sunday, we’ll take a quick look at the major movers in the bracket. 

Bracketology in brief: Two-bid Ivy

The Ivy League is poised to take an at-large bid from the power conferences after Columbia upset previously No. 23-ranked Princeton, 70-56, on Friday night to sweep the season series. Princeton has the resume to reach its fifth consecutive NCAA Tournament and its 13th in 16 years, even if it doesn’t win the Ivy League championship. And it’s increasingly looking like it might be stopped again by the Lions. That’s a win for the Ivy League, and one less entry for everyone else. 

Duke’s recent success was rewarded as the No. 10 seed. It will be interesting to see if the Blue Devils can climb higher since they aren’t facing the same caliber of competition as SEC and Big Ten teams above them. They finish the season with a rematch against UNC (Duke won, 72-68, on Sunday) and will likely face Louisville in the ACC Tournament. The Cardinals landed at No. 7 in the reveal. Their resumes line up nicely, except the Cardinals were more competitive in their losses to top competition. 

Performance of the week: Maryland

The masters of comebacks delivered again. The then-No. 20 Terps came back from down 19 points to take a 76-75 win over then-No. 8 Ohio State on the road on Sunday. They went on a 35-11 run over a 13-minute span in the second half to secure a signature win. It tied the largest comeback in program history, and the first road win over a top-10 team since 2022. 

Building large leads over Maryland is a fraught affair for opponents. Maryland erased a 17-point lead in the final three minutes against Iowa last month, but didn’t have enough in overtime to win. And the Terps, trailing by nine, scored 10 points in less than a minute to stun Minnesota, 100-99, in double overtime in December. 

Maryland faced a difficult go this season with four season-ending injuries leading to a 9-6 Big Ten record. A win over Ohio State will secure their spot in the tournament’s top 16 — at least for now. 

Honorable mentions: Carnegie scored 18 of her 29 points in the first half to lift Georgia over Vanderbilt. Raven Johnson scored a season-high 19 (double her game average) and led South Carolina’s late-game push against LSU. 

Stat of the week: 16 combined titles in 17 years

South Dakota State is the cream of the crop in the Summit League, but its streak of five consecutive regular-season conference titles is at stake. The Jackrabbits (20-6, 10-2) are tied with South Dakota (20-6, 10-2), the rival with whom they’ve dominated the conference for nearly two decades. But it’s North Dakota State (23-2, 12-0) that leads the conference race. The Bison already defeated SDSU, 76-68, and South Dakota, 79-56, once each. They’ll play them back-to-back at the end of February. 

North Dakota State has yet to win a Summit League Tournament title and only made one final, a 67-54 loss to SDSU in 2023-24. The Bison have never competed in the NCAA Tournament. Only one team, Western Illinois in 2017, has broken the hold South Dakota and SDSU have on the Summit League. The two combined to win 16 of the previous 17 tournament titles. 

Game(s) of the week: Ole Miss vs. three of SEC’s best 

The Rebels are in contention to host NCAA Tournament games for the first time since 1989, but need a strong showing to end the season. And it’s not easy. They are in their most difficult stretch, beginning with last week’s uncompetitive 74-57 loss to Kentucky, then ranked No. 18 in the poll. Within a six-day span, the Rebels (20-6, 7-4) will face three of the five teams ahead of them in the SEC standings. The Tennessee matchup was a rescheduled one from the winter storm this month; the Sunday matinee will receive the College Gameday treatment. 

Tuesday: vs. Tennessee (16-7, 8-3), 7 p.m. ET, ESPNU
Thursday: vs. LSU (22-4, 8-4), 9 p.m. ET, ESPN
Sunday: at South Carolina (25-2, 11-1), 12 p.m. ET, ESPN2

Also this week: Iowa vs. Michigan, Sunday at 12 p.m. ET on FOX. They are both vying for top-16 seed lines.

Yahoo Sports’ AP ballot

1. UConn
2. UCLA
3. South Carolina
4. LSU
5. Texas
6. Michigan
7. Louisville
8. Vanderbilt
9. Ohio State
10. Duke
11. Oklahoma
12. Kentucky
13. Iowa
14. Baylor
15. Maryland
16. Michigan State
17. Tennessee
18. TCU
19. West Virginia
20. Ole Miss
21. Minnesota
22. Princeton
23. Texas Tech
24. Georgia
25. Rhode Island

Official AP Top 25

1. UConn
2. UCLA
3. South Carolina
4. Texas
5. Vanderbilt
6. Michigan
7. LSU
8. Louisville
9. Duke
10. Ohio State
11. Oklahoma
12. TCU
13. Iowa
14. Maryland
15. Baylor
16. Kentucky
17. Ole Miss
18. Michigan State
19. West Virginia
20. Texas Tech
21. Tennessee
22. North Carolina
23. Minnesota
24. Georgia
25. Alabama