NCAA Women's Basketball Bracket's Top 16 Seeds Revealed Before 2026 Selection Sunday

Ahead of the official bracket reveal on Sunday, the top 16 seeds in the 2026 NCAA women's basketball tournament have been unveiled.

The selection committee announced the first 16 teams in the field on Saturday, led by undefeated Connecticut.

No specific seeds were revealed. That will be reserved for Sunday's selection show. Here are the 16 teams that will be seeded on the No. 1, No. 2, No. 3 and No. 4 lines in this year's tournament:

• Duke
• Iowa
• Louisville
• LSU
• Michigan
• Minnesota
• North Carolina
• Ohio State
• Oklahoma
• South Carolina
• TCU
• Texas
• UCLA
• UConn
• Vanderbilt
• West Virginia

Connecticut will once again enter the tournament as a strong frontrunner to win the national title for the second consecutive year and 13th time in Geno Auriemma's tenure.

The Huskies put together one of the most impressive regular seasons in program history, an incredibly high bar to clear. Their average point differential is 38.4 per game.

For comparison, during their run of four consecutive national titles from 2012 to '16, the first two teams didn't have an average margin of victory that strong.

UConn steamrolled its way through the Big East tournament, winning all three games by at least 39 points. Its 72-69 win over Michigan on Nov. 21 is the only game it didn't win by at least 10 points.

If Connecticut does stumble at any point, UCLA will vault into pole position as the title favorite. Head coach Cori Close's team won 31 of 32 games in the regular season and went undefeated in Big Ten play, highlighted by an easy 96-45 win over Iowa in the conference title game.

Despite a slip up in the SEC championship game, South Carolina is always dangerous. Dawn Staley hasn't lost in the tournament before the Final Four since the 2018-19 season, with two national titles in three championship game appearances over the previous four years.

Even with the loss to Texas at the end of the SEC tournament, the Gamecocks had strong wins over Kentucky and LSU in their first two games that proved how battle-tested they are.

If you're looking for a team not seed one or two that could potentially make a run to the national title, TCU has a lot of pieces to go far. The Horned Frogs finished top 20 in both offensive and defensive rating, good wins over Baylor (twice) and West Virginia, plus a two point loss to Ohio State on a neutral site.

There are a lot of new pieces on the roster from last year's Elite Eight run, led by Olivia Miles and Marta Suarez. They play fast and can cause many teams above them in the seeding a lot of problems with that aggressive pace.