Women’s March Madness is producing fewer upsets, but closer games

This spotlight season for women’s college basketball isn’t merely creating brighter stars and bigger ratings.

It’s also producing closer games.

The average margin of victory in NCAA Tournament women’s games this year has been 15 points. That average had hovered between 16.2 and 17.2 for each of the previous four women’s tournaments, contributing to the appearance that the sport lacked comeptitiveness.

Upsets remain rare

For all the excitement the NCAA women’s tournament has produced this year, it hasn’t generated many surprises.

Only three lower-seeded teams won in the first two rounds: No. 11 seed Middle Tennessee knocked off No. 6 Louisville on a neutral site in the round of 64, while No. 5 seed Colorado won at No. 4 seed Kansas State and No. 5 seed Baylor won at No. 4 seed Virginia Tech in the round of 32.

Last year, seven lower seeds won games in the round of 64 alone, though no higher-seeded teams lost on their home floors.

Still, every team that reached the Final Four had at least one close call.

Iowa was tied with West Virginia with just over two minutes left in their second-round game. South Carolina was clinging to a two-point lead over Indiana in the closing minutes of a regional semifinal.

UConn led Syracuse by only two points with a couple of minutes left in their second-round game. North Carolina State watched its 20-point lead over Tennessee shrink to two in the fourth quarter before pulling away for a second-round victory.

Close games

Twenty-six of the 64 men’s games so far have either reached overtime or were decided by fewer than 10 points (Northwestern’s first-round overtime win over Florida Atlantic and Creighton’s double-overtime triumph over Oregon in the round of 32 both ended up with double-digit victory margins).

The women’s tournament has featured 23 games with margins of fewer than 10 points.