Welcome back, college sports fans. Because there are no Women’s games today, it is the first Men’s only gameday since March 17 which was the first day of the Tournament season (games in the NIT and NCAA). The Women started the next day. During that 16-day span, the Men have had three days with no games (March 23, 30, 31) while playing 97 (of the 105) scheduled games, or 7.46 games per day scheduled. The Women have had just two off days (March 17, 31) while playing 141 of the 145 scheduled, or 10.07 games per day. The Women play their last game on April 5th, while the Men finish the next day.
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We mention this because Women’s Basketball has come a long way since Smith College in 1892 when the Freshmen played the Sophomores. Originally, because basketball was considered too “physical” for women, games were either six-on-six or nine-on-nine, with the court divided into zones to limit “fatigue.” The first intercollegiate game was in 1896 between Berkeley and Stanford. In the 1930’s the strongest teams were from Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) which contributed to the expansion of the NCAA tournament decades later. It wasn’t until 1971 that women played the same five-on-five, full-court game the men played. In 1972, Title IX mandated funding equality which launched women’s sports on a large scale. From 1973 to 1982, the NCAA did not have tournaments for women’s basketball, which was, instead, governed by the Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW). There were two teams who won three championships each, the AIAW record: Immaculata and Delta State. Those two teams won the first six years. UCLA won in 1978, then back-to-back titles for Old Dominion, followed by LA Tech. Rutgers took the final AIAW title in 1982 in an overlap year with the NCAA who got on board with LA Tech winning the first NCAA championship. From 1982-1985, there were just 32 teams. Slowly expanding to 64 by 1994. Since 2022, the women have had the 68-team bracket they use today. UCONN has the most NCAA championships of any school.
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We wrote this on “Men’s Only Day” because we find it interesting that while basketball was originally considered too difficult for women to play with the same rules as men, we have evolved to see Women’s tournaments, with the same (NCAA) or larger (NIT) bracket, complete their games in fewer days than the Men – meaning less recovery time between the rounds.
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Yesterday, the GCR was just 1-1 (.500) for both the Women and Men, missing Illinois St over South Dakota and Oklahoma over Colorado. In total, we are now 388-168 (.698) with the Women at 202-78 (.721) and the Men at 188-90 (.676).
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Today, we have four games including the second half of the CBC opening round and the NIT semifinals. The College Basketball Crown has no seeding, so we list them as “U”. Here are today’s games.
| Tour/ Round | Time | April 2nd Men’s Games (All Times Eastern) | Conf | Seeds | Pred |
| NIT/SF | 7:00 | New Mexico (26-10/44) / Tulsa (29-7/46) | MTW/AAC | 1/1 | NMEX |
| CBC/QF | 8:00 | Stanford (20-12/60) / West Virginia (18-14/108) | ACC/B12 | U/U | STAN |
| NIT/SF | 9:30 | Illinois St (23-12/68) / Auburn (20-16/63) | MVC/SEC | 4/1 | AUB |
| CBC/QF | 10:30 | Rutgers (14-19/215) / Creighton (15-17/163) | B10/BEast | U/U | CREI |
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That’s it for today. Hope you enjoyed a little history of the game. Tune in tomorrow for more games. We look forward to comments or suggestions – they make us better. Thank you for reading and sharing with others, JoJo and G.
