Why the Ivy League deserves more attention in women’s college basketball this season

It’s possible that we could get a multi-bid Ivy League for the third time this season. Harvard, Princeton and Columbia all look capable of making the NCAA Tournament.

February is nearing its end, which means that March Madness is just around the corner. And for college basketball fans, that means it’s time to really start diving into bracketology. Who is a lock to be in the NCAA Tournament? Who is definitely out of the 68-team field? Who is on the bubble? And which mid-major leagues might be multi-bid leagues?

Let’s address that latter question and turn our attention toward the northeastern corridor of the country, where the Ivy League once again looks like the best mid-major league in women’s basketball.

This strong season for the Ivy comes off the heels of last year, when the league got multiple teams into the NCAA Tournament for just the second time ever. The first was in 2016, when Penn won the Ivy but Courtney Banghart’s Princeton earned an at-large bid. One of Banghart’s assistants on that Princeton squad was Megan Griffith, who coached an Abbey Hsu-powered Columbia team to an at-large bid last season, marking the first time ever the Lions made the NCAA Tournament.

It’s possible we could see a multi-bid Ivy League for the third time this postseason.

Three teams from the conference – Harvard (32), Columbia (42), and Princeton (50) – all rank in the top 50 of the NCAA’s NET rankings. In his latest projections released Friday morning, ESPN’s Charlie Creme has the Ivy getting two teams in the field, Columbia as the automatic qualifier and Harvard getting an at-large bid, with Princeton just on the other side of the bubble as one of the first four teams out. At HerHoopStats, Megan Gauer projects the same: Columbia as the league winner, Harvard as an at-large and Princeton just on the outside. At The Athletic, Mark Schindler also projects the Crimson and Lions in the field of 68.

The Ivy are one of five conferences who have at least three teams ranked in the top 50 in NET in women’s college basketball. The others are all Power 4 leagues: the Big Ten, the Big 12, SEC and ACC.

Harvard, Columbia and Princeton all find themselves in this situation, where they’re bucking the status quo for mid-majors, for two reasons; First, all three scheduled tough games – and won a few of them – during the non-conference slate. And second, the top of the Ivy League is really good, with these three squads leading the way.

The Crimson —led by Harmoni Turner and coached by another Banghart padawan, Carrie Moore — are a combined 6-3 in games against Quad 1, 2 and 3 opponents. Their most impressive victory was their second game of the season, a road overtime win at Indiana. Most recently, the Crimson beat Columbia on the road by six points.

Columbia, which is still coached by Griffith and paced on the court by Kitty Henderson and Riley Weiss, owns wins over Princeton and Harvard in addition to a victory over a fellow mid-major power in Florida Gulf Coast. The Lions are 4-5 in games against teams in the top three quads.

Princeton, coached by Carla Berube who took the reins from Banghart in 2019, have won three straight Ivy League tournaments and is eyeing what would be its 12th NCAA Tournament appearance in 15 seasons. Despite losing one star guard, Kaitlyn Chen, to UConn, and another in Madison St. Rose to an injury, the Tigers haven’t missed a beat. Berube’s team owns wins over Villanova, Seton Hall, Rutgers, Rhode Island and Harvard, as well as NCAA Tournament regular Middle Tennessee State.

All of this brings us to Saturday, where Columbia and Princeton will meet for the second time this season at 5:30 p.m. ET in New Jersey in a game on ESPN+. If you’re invested in bracketology, or you care about the Ivy League, or if you simply want to watch some great college basketball, this game is a must-watch.

Next Friday, Princeton travels to Harvard in another consequential contest.

The NCAA Tournament is supposed to be about putting the best 68 teams in the country in a bracket and seeing who comes out on top. Using almost any metric you want, it’s easy to argue that these three Ivy League teams belong in that group and belong in the Big Dance. Instead of rooting for Power 4 programs with soft schedules or near-.500 records in conference play to make the field, we should be rooting for teams like Princeton, Harvard and Columbia. We should be rooting for teams like Fairfield and South Florida to make the field even if they don’t win their conference tournament. And we should be rooting for a league like the A-10 to get multiple bids too. We should be rooting for the best basketball teams to make the NCAA Tournament, regardless of conference affiliation.