NCAA ladies’s basketball Blue Bloods: Who joins UConn, Tennessee?

In ladies’s school basketball, Geno Auriemma’s UConn Huskies at the moment are, unquestionably, the best and most iconic program within the sport. UConn has captured 12 nationwide titles unfold throughout 4 a long time of excellence, produced numerous superior gamers and went to 14 consecutive Closing Fours between 2008 and 2022.

However what concerning the different terrific and tremendous profitable packages within the sport, just like the Notre Dames and Tennessees and Stanfords? Who else belongs within the group of Blue Bloods in ladies’s school basketball?

What does and doesn’t outline a Blue Blood is totally arbitrary and up for debate. In males’s basketball, some assume Indiana nonetheless belongs though the Hoosiers haven’t received a nationwide title since 1987 and have missed six of the final eight NCAA Tournaments. In the meantime, some nonetheless overlook UConn’s males’s workforce though it has received six titles since 1999. Blue Blood standing may be much more troublesome to decipher in school soccer, however you realize it while you see it: Alabama and Ohio State are completely a part of that group, however what concerning the Combating Irish, who haven’t received a nationwide championship since earlier than the daybreak of the BCS? Ought to Clemson be in that group?

We’ll save these arguments for an additional day. That is all about ladies’s school basketball.

Right here’s my extremely unscientific standards for Blue Bloods in ladies’s hoops:

With that standards in thoughts, we have now seven packages who at the moment have Blue Blood standing in ladies’s school basketball. For the packages overlooked, there’s a approach again to say that standing, similar to there are methods that a few of these groups can fall out. If the Trojans, Tar Heels, Tigers or Longhorns win a second nationwide title someday quickly, they’re again within the combine. The highway again to relevancy is longer for the likes of Previous Dominion and Louisiana Tech, however we must always fondly look again at their dominance within the Nineteen Eighties and Nineties, and bear in mind them as the primary Blue Bloods of the game.

Right here’s a better have a look at our ladies’s school basketball Blue Blood membership, listed alphabetically:

Kim Mulkey turned Baylor right into a powerhouse, lacking the NCAA Event simply as soon as in 21 seasons in Waco. Since she left for LSU, Nicki Collen has saved issues rolling, going 102-36 — a .739 successful share — in her 4 seasons main the Girl Bears. This system has produced three winners of the Wade Trophy up to now 15 years, from Brittney Griner to Odyssey Sims to NaLyssa Smith. They proceed to be a contender in a new-look Huge 12.

It’s been some time since Maryland has competed for a nationwide championship, and it’s the one program right here with only a single title, however few packages have been extra constant than Brenda Frese’s Terps since she took the reins in School Park in 2002. Since lacking the NCAA Event in 2010, Maryland hasn’t had a shedding document in convention play, has been to each March Insanity since, has completed the season ranked contained in the AP high 10 seven instances, and has captured seven Huge Ten match crowns. The Terps proceed to be one of many sport’s constantly nice packages — a normal set by former coach Chris Weller when she was piling up ACC Event trophies a long time in the past.

Like Baylor underneath Mulkey, Notre Dame grew to become a nationwide energy in ladies’s basketball throughout the 2000s and 2010s underneath the steering of Muffet McGraw. Between 1996 and 2019, an NCAA Event wasn’t performed with out the Combating Irish, a program that has produced iconic gamers and nationwide award winners like Ruth Riley, Skylar Diggins and Arike Ogunbowale. Since ending runner-up to Baylor in 2019, the Irish haven’t superior previous the Candy 16. It’s as much as Niele Ivey to uphold McGraw’s normal now.

One may simply make the case that no program has been as profitable as South Carolina within the final decade. Along with seven Closing 4 journeys and three titles, the Gamecocks went 167-9 from 2020 by means of 2024, notching the most effective win share within the nation over that stretch. South Carolina was an afterthought in ladies’s basketball for a few years, after which Daybreak Staley arrived in 2008 and proceeded to rework the Gamecocks into one of many sport’s Dying Stars with all-time superior gamers like A’ja Wilson, Aliyah Boston and Kamilla Cardoso.

No NCAA Event was performed with out Stanford in it from 1988 by means of 2024. That streak, which dated again to the Reagan Administration, ended this previous season — Kate Paye’s first yr on the job after taking on for the legendary Tara VanDerveer. As Stanford and the game enter a brand new period, the place the Cardinal are within the ACC and coping with the Home Settlement and switch portal, its long-term standing as a Blue Blood appears to be fragile. Can the Cardinal proceed to win at a excessive stage and compete for nationwide championships on this new period? We’ll see.

Whereas eight nationwide championships and 18 Closing Fours are extremely spectacular, all of these heights have been reached by the Girl Vols when the late Pat Summitt was the top coach. Since her retirement, Tennessee has struggled to place itself in place to compete for nationwide championships. With the rise of South Carolina and LSU, the SEC is loads harder now too. Issues regarded promising this previous season underneath first-year head coach Kim Caldwell, because the Girl Vols embraced her type of play, beat rival UConn and superior to the Candy 16. Tennessee being a constant nationwide contender once more can be a superb factor for the game.

Loads of people have been able to signal UConn’s loss of life certificates after it went — *gasp!* — eight years with out successful a nationwide title as parity within the sport elevated following Breanna Stewart’s dominant run with the Huskies. However Paige Bueckers, Azzi Fudd and Sarah Sturdy put the Huskies again on high this previous spring in Tampa, powering UConn to its twelfth championship underneath Geno Auriemma. Not like a few of its previous contemporaries and rivals from the Nineties and 2000s, we all know that UConn is provided to compete for extra championships on this new period of girls’s school basketball. Though Auriemma is 71, the Huskies present no indicators of slowing down.