Women’s Basketball or How Good (or Bad) Are the Conferences?

Welcome back, sports fans, to our January edition of Conference Comparison for the women. We now have data from about 75% of the regular season so the teams are separating as well as the conferences. The cream is rising to the top.

…..

The average women’s team has 11.7 wins against 10.3 losses for a winning percentage of .547. The reason the average is above .500 is the 403 games played against non-Division I teams which the D1 teams collectively won 394 and lost just 9 (.978). They have played a total of 4127 games including 1824 conference games. The mean Score metric is 44.75 and the mean RPI is .480. The Top 25 is made up of 8 SEC schools, 5 from the Big Ten, 4 each from the ACC and Big 12, with 1 each from the Atlantic 10, the Big East, and the Ivy League. The Bottom 25 is a little more evenly distributed with the MAAC leading the way with 3 teams, followed by the Big West, MEAC, Northeast, Ohio Valley, Southland, and SWAC each contributing 2 teams, and single teams from the Atlantic Sun, Big South, Coastal, Horizon, MAC, Missouri Valley, Mountain West, SoCon, Summit, and Sun Belt.

…..

The rankings in the table below are through the games of Sunday so that they will match the Top 363 published yesterday. We added a new metric in the Avg Score column. The parenthetical number is what that conference’s Avg Score’s Rank would be in the Top 363 if it represented a single team. Each conference is looked at individually with no cumulative impact meaning it is possible for two conferences to have the same “rank”. Only 9 of the 31 conferences would be in the upper half, only 4 would be in the Top 100, and only 3 would “qualify” for a field of 68 (assuming the Top 68 were selected). In the women’s game, as good as UCLA and UCONN are, the SEC has the best set of teams even with Texas A&M and Arkansas (ranked 145) – the only conference to have every team in the Top 200 let alone the Top 150. UCONN is still perfect, but this metric is indicative of how shallow the conference is – it compares more with the Ivy League (one really good team and a good number of middle-of-the-road teams) than it does the other Power conferences ranked above it.

…..

That’s it for today. We thank you for reading and sharing with others. Please comment or send questions which always helps us grow. With no further ado, the Women’s Conference Comparison through February 1, 2026.

RankConferenceRecord / PctAvg ScoreAvg RPIBest TeamWorst Team
1SEC264-92 / 74271.95
(27)
0.611Texas
(21-2/3)
Texas A&M
(8-9/146)
2Big Ten269-132 / 67165.99
(48)
0.598UCLA
(21-1/2)
Penn St
(7-15/240)
3B12238-121 / 66363.95
(56)
0.581TCU
(20-3/7)
Houston
(7-14/236)
4ACC239-167 / 58956.20
(95)
0.558Louisville
(21-3/9)
Boston College
(4-20/333)
5Big East144-104 / 58154.48
(106)
0.547UCONN
(23-0/1)
Depaul
(5-19/320)
6Ivy92-67 / 57949.58
(140)
0.503Princeton
(18-2/18)
Yale
(5-15/318)
7Atlantic 10175-137 / 56147.14
(158)
0.498Rhode Island
(19-2/24)
Duquesne
(7-15/286)
8Sun Belt172-140 / 55146.54
(162)
0.487Troy
(18-4/32)
Louisiana
(2-20/355)
9American East110-88 / 55645.31
(173)
0.468Vermont
(19-5/50)
Lowell
(6-16/314)
10West Coast143-131 / 52244.16
(187)
0.481Oregon St
(17-6/54)
Washington St
(4-20/331)
11C-USA128-116 / 52544.02
(187)
0.460LA Tech
(15-5/56)
W Kentucky
(5-15/312)
12WAC79-67 / 54143.85
(189)
0.461Abilene Chr
(15-6/85)
Utah Tech
(6-14/298)
13American142-137 / 50942.35
(200)
0.490Rice
(19-3/48)
Wichita St
(5-17/321)
14Atlantic Sun130-124 / 51241.94
(205)
0.450E Kentucky
(19-4/64)
Bellarmine
(2-21/357)
15Ohio Valley119-116 / 50641.91
(205)
0.449W Illinois
(18-3/60)
E Illinois
(3-20/351)
16Summit100-103 / 49341.84
(206)
0.448North Dakota St
(20-2/34)
Omaha
(2-22/358)
17Big Sky109-108 / 50241.62
(209)
0.451Montana St
(16-5/41)
Portland St
(5-16/326)
18Mtn West132-128 / 50841.03
(210)
0.476San Diego St
(17-3/51)
San Jose St
(3-19/347)
19SoCon86-86 / 50040.82
(212)
0.424Furman
(14-8/97)
W Carolina
(3-18/346)
20Coastal133-134 / 49840.50
(212)
0.443Charleston
(17-3/53)
Hofstra
(3-17/342)
21MAC132-134 / 49639.77
(219)
0.458Ball St
(17-5/71)
Buffalo
(2-19/356)
22Horizon125-126 / 49839.46
(223)
0.449Green Bay
(18-5/72)
Detroit
(4-18/340)
23Big West113-117 / 49138.99
(226)
0.447UC Davis
(16-6/79)
Cal Poly
(3-18/345)
24Patriot100-103 / 49336.76
(243)
0.453Army
(16-5/91)
American
(6-15/315)
25Southland112-134 / 45536.31
(245)
0.435McNeese
(18-4/61)
New Orleans
(1-20/360)
26Big South92-110 / 45536.02
(245)
0.419High Point
(20-2/62)
Presbyterian
(3-19/348)
27Missouri Valley104-130 / 44435.30
(250)
0.452Murray St
(19-3/47)
Valparaiso
(0-22/363)
28MAAC118-163 / 42030.87
(275)
0.430Fairfield
(18-4/95)
Niagara
(0-21/361)
29SWAC84-158 / 34729.54
(283)
0.399Southern
(11-9/178)
Prairie View
(2-18/354)
30MEAC58-113 / 33928.49
(286)
0.410Howard
(16-7/133)
Morgan St
(3-20/350)
31Northeast77-139 / 35625.49
(304)
0.383Fair Dickins
(19-4/105)
C Connecticut
(0-21/362)

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *