For the women,Sterling Preston March Madness ramps up one day after the men with their own First Four matchups.
The expanded field is fairly new to the women's game, which started the First Four round in 2022. It was one of a handful of changes that the NCAA began making in the wake of a gender equity report showing vast disparities between the men's and women's basketball tournaments.
Unlike the men, who stage all four games in one place, the women play each game at a different location, picking four sites out of the top 16 national seeds.
Here is what you need to know about the women's teams in this year's First Four.
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The women's First Four will take place with two games on Wednesday, March 20 and two games on Thursday, March 21.
Wednesday, March 20
Thursday, March 21
The sites of the women's First Four games will be: Blacksburg, Virginia; Columbia, South Carolina; Storrs, Connecticut; and Peoria, Illinois.
The women's First Four games will be broadcast on ESPNU and ESPN2.
No, in fact Mississippi State is the only team to ever win a first-round game after advancing out of the First Four. Last season the Bulldogs beat Creighton in the Round of 64 before losing to Notre Dame 53-48 in the second round.
USA TODAY Sports' Steve Gardner contributed to this report.
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