2024–25 NCAA Division I women's basketball season

2024–25 NCAA Division I women's basketball season
Preseason AP No. 1	South Carolina
Regular season	November 4, 2024 – March 16, 2025
NCAA Tournament	2025
Tournament dates	March 19 – April 6, 2025
National Championship	Amalie Arena Tampa, Florida
← 2023–24 2025–26 →

The 2024–25 NCAA Division I women's basketball season began on November 4, 2024. The regular season will end on March 16, 2025, with the 2025 NCAA Division I women's basketball tournament beginning with the first four on March 19 and ending with championship game at the Amalie Arena in Tampa, Florida on April 6.

On May 2, 2024, the NCAA Basketball Rules Committee proposed a few rule changes for the 2024–25 season. These changes were approved on June 6 by the Playing Rules Oversight Panel.^[1][2]

• A one-game suspension has been added to the ejection of any player, coach, or bench personnel who "disrespectfully contacts an official or makes a threat of physical intimidation or harm, to include pushing, shoving, spitting or attempting to make physical contact with an official".
• Officials will be able to review whether a player's foot last touching the court was inbounds on a made shot before time expired. If a player's foot is determined to be out of bounds, officials would put the exact time of the violation on the game clock. However, if the shot is made and time remains on the game clock, a video review would not occur.
• Officials will now immediately conduct a replay review to judge whether a basket should count or not if an off-ball foul is called near the time a field goal or free-throw attempt is occurring. Previously, these reviews were conducted during the next electronic-media timeout.

• May 29, 2024 – Stephen F. Austin announced it would leave the Western Athletic Conference on July 1 to rejoin the Southland Conference after a three-year absence.^[3]
• July 1 – IUPUI's athletic teams renamed to Indiana University Indianapolis (IU Indy) after the Indiana and Purdue university systems split the university into IU Indianapolis and Purdue University in Indianapolis.^[4]
• September 12 – The Pac-12 Conference, which had been reduced to 2 members after its remaining 10 schools left for other power conferences, began a rebuilding process by announcing that Mountain West Conference members Boise State, Colorado State, Fresno State, and San Diego State would join the Pac-12 in 2026–27.^[5]
• September 24 – The Pac-12 Conference's rebuilding continued as Utah State would join the other Mountain West defectors in 2026–27.^[6]
• September 30 – Gonzaga announced it would leave the West Coast Conference to join the Pac-12 Conference for all sports except for football in 2026–27.^[7]
• October 1 – UTEP announced it would join the Mountain West from Conference USA in 2026–27.^[8]
• October 9:^[9]
  • The NCAA Division I Council approved a proposal that reduced the duration of the transfer portal to 30 days. Going forward, the window opens on the day after the completion of the second round of the Division I women's tournament.
  • The Council also abolished the National Letter of Intent program effective immediately. Written offers of athletics aid will replace the NLI.
  • The Council introduced a proposal that would shorten the transition periods for schools wishing to reclassify from Division II or Division III to Division I. If approved at the Council's January 2025 meeting, the transition periods for D-II and D-III schools would drop by a year, respectively to three and four years.
• October 15 – The Mountain West announced that Hawaiʻi, which has been a football-only member of that conference since 2012, would leave the Big West Conference in 2026 to become a full MW member.^[10]
• November 1 – The Mountain West announced that Grand Canyon would join the conference no later than 2026 for all sports except for football.^[11] Grand Canyon's official announcement stated that it would not compete in the West Coast Conference, which it had previously been scheduled to join in July 2025, and that if MW bylaws allowed, it would join that conference in 2025.^[12]
• November 7 – The Texas A&M University System Board of Regents approved the name change of the former Texas A&M University–Commerce to East Texas A&M University.^[13]
• December 10 – The MW announced that UC Davis would join the conference in non-football sports in 2026.^[14]

• November 15 – UConn head coach Geno Auriemma drew even with recently retired Stanford coach Tara VanDerveer as the winningest head coach in NCAA basketball history across all divisions, earning his 1,216th win with the Huskies' 69–58 win over North Carolina.^[15]
• November 20 – Auriemma took sole possession of the career wins record with UConn's 85–41 rout of Fairleigh Dickinson.^[16]
• December 14 – Tennessee defeated North Carolina Central, 139–59, and broke multiple school and NCAA records in the process. These include largest margin of victory in program history (80), and most three-point field goals made in Division I history (30).^[17]

A total of 23 schools joined new conferences for the 2024–25 season. Of these, 20 moved within Division I, two began reclassification from NCAA Division II, and Chicago State ended its two-year stint as an all-sports independent to join the Northeast Conference.

The 2024–25 will be the last season in their respective conferences for at least five Division I schools.

• Georgia Southern will leave the Hanner Fieldhouse after 55 seasons there for the new Hill Convocation Center. The team will play its first game in the Hill Convocation Center in December 2024.^[18]
• St. Thomas will play their final season at Schoenecker Arena, where they have played since 1981, before moving to the new Lee and Penny Anderson Arena, which will open in the 2025–26 season.^[19]
• Vermont was originally slated to open their new arena, Tarrant Event Center, as a replacement for the current arena, Patrick Gym. Construction was to continue in 2021 but it has been delayed indefinitely.^[20]

• West Georgia will transition from Division II to Division I and play at the Coliseum in Carrollton, Georgia, where it has played since 2009. It will be ineligible for NCAA-organized postseason play (i.e., the NCAA tournament or NIT) in 2029.
• Mercyhurst will transition from Division II to Division I and play at the Owen McCormick Court in Erie, Pennsylvania (formerly Mercyhurst Athletic Center but renovated in 2021), where it has played since 1977. It will be ineligible for NCAA-organized postseason play for 2029.

• Bellarmine announced on August 28, 2024 that home games would return to campus at Knights Hall for the first time since 2019–20. The Knights had played in the interim at Freedom Hall on the grounds of the Kentucky Exposition Center.^[21]

The Top 25 from the AP and USA Today Coaching polls.

Rankings reflect the AP poll Top 25.

• Nov. 10, 2024
  • No. 1 South Carolina defeated No. 9 NC State, 71–57 (Ally Tipoff – Spectrum Center, Charlotte, NC)
• Nov. 23
  • No. 6 Notre Dame defeated No. 3 USC, 74–61 (Galen Center, Los Angeles, CA)
• Nov. 24
  • No. 5 UCLA defeated No. 1 South Carolina, 77–62 (Pauley Pavilion, Los Angeles, CA)
• Dec. 5
  • No. 10 Notre Dame defeated No. 4 Texas, 80–70^OT (ACC–SEC Challenge – Joyce Center, Notre Dame, IN)
  • No. 3 South Carolina defeated No. 8 Duke, 81–70 (ACC–SEC Challenge – Colonial Life Arena, Columbia, SC)
• Dec. 8
  • No. 3 South Carolina defeated No. 9 TCU, 85–53 (Coast-to-Coast Challenge – Dickies Arena, Fort Worth, TX)
• Dec. 12
  • No. 8 Notre Dame defeated No. 2 UConn, 79–68 (Rivalry – Joyce Center, Notre Dame, IN)
• Dec. 21
  • No. 7 USC defeated No. 4 UConn, 72–70 (XL Center, Hartford, CT)
• Jan. 2, 2025
  • No. 5 Texas defeated No. 9 Oklahoma, 80–73 (Lloyd Noble Center, Norman, OK)

An upset is a victory by an underdog team. In the context of NCAA Division I women's basketball, this generally constitutes an unranked team defeating a team currently ranked in the top 25. This list will highlight those upsets of ranked teams by unranked teams as well as upsets of No. 1 teams. Rankings are from the AP poll. Bold type indicates winning teams in "true road games"—i.e., those played on an opponent's home court (including secondary homes). Italics type indicates winning teams in an early-season tournament (or event). Early-season tournaments are tournaments played in the early season. Events are the tournaments with the same teams in it every year (even rivalry games).

In addition to the above listed upsets in which an unranked team defeated a ranked team, there have been five non-Division I teams to defeat a Division I team so far this season. Bold type indicates winning teams in "true road games"—i.e., those played on an opponent's home court (including secondary homes).

Each of the 31 Division I athletic conferences will end its regular season with a single-elimination tournament. The team with the best regular-season record in each conference receives the number one seed in each tournament, with tiebreakers used as needed in the case of ties for the top seeding. Unless otherwise noted, the winners of these tournaments will receive automatic invitations to the 2025 NCAA Division I women's basketball tournament.

Per the NCAA, an upset occurs when the losing team in an NCAA tournament game was seeded at least two seed lines better than the winning team.