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Charlie Creme, ESPN.com
Get ready to add the word “quad” to women’s college basketball vocabulary this season. The NCAA Division I women’s basketball committee made a subtle yet important decision over the summer that takes another step toward equating the men’s and women’s NCAA tournaments. Starting with the upcoming 2024-25 season, the women’s tournament will use the quadrant-based system as part of the evaluation process for selecting the 68 teams to participate in March Madness.
Just as the women’s committee abandoned the RPI for the NET (NCAA Evaluation Tool) as the chief metric used to rate teams for the 2020-21 season a few years after the men, the “quad system” — which the men’s committee adopted in 2017 — will be in place to measure the quality of a win or a loss for the women. The quad system puts games in groups, employing a sliding scale to account for where the game was played.
The NET will still be used as foundational ranking system for all teams, but now the quality of a win or loss will be determined by Quadrants 1-4 rather than top 25 NET, top 50 NET or top 100 NET.
At its core, the shift to the use of quadrants doesn’t change the big picture. Good is still good. A bad loss will be just as evident as it was last season. South Carolina would still have been the overwhelming favorite heading into the NCAA tournament had quads been in place in March. The excitement around Caitlin Clark and Iowa would still have produced the Hawkeyes’ first No. 1 seed since 1992. Columbia, Miami and Villanova would still have been battling it out for the final spot in the tournament field.
But questions always come with change. We tackle the answers and how the move to the quad system might impact the season and what March looks like in 2025.
What is a quad?
It’s a grouping of games based on the opponents rating and where the game was played. The selection committee on its team sheets — the collection of all the relevant data for each team under consideration — will include the record for each of four quadrants. The NET rating remains the foundational piece of that scale.
A game at home against a team ranked between 1 to 25 in the NET, on a neutral court against an opponent 1 to 35 and on the road versus a 1 to 40 ranked team, is classified as Quad 1. These are the wins that will be most discussed all season. The better a team’s Quad 1 record is, the better its NCAA tournament seed is likely to be.
Quad 2 is home 26 to 55, neutral 36 to 65 and road 46 to 80.
Quad 3 is home 56 to 90, neutral 66 to 105 and road 81 to 130.
Quad 4 is home 91-plus, neutral 106-plus and away 131-plus.
These ranges are based on historical data from the women’s game since 2010 and are unique to women’s basketball. For those familiar with the men’s game, these are not the same quadrant ranges.
How will using the quads be different?
This is just a slightly different way of looking at a win or a loss. The quads present as an easier way to identify that winning on the road is more difficult and is rewarded more substantially. The quadrant ranges essentially replace top-25, top-50 and top-100 records.
The terminology used by commentators, writers and, especially, bracketologists will change from “South Carolina is 6-0 against the NET top 25 and 17-0 versus the NET top 50” to “South Carolina’s record against Quad 1 opponents is 12-0.”
The difference in these records shines a light on when the home/neutral/road ranges are applied and how the definition of a top-quality win can change.
How will they be incorporated?
The selection committee will use the records of each team within the four quads as its benchmark on the strength of a résumé. The quality of a win is now largely defined by the quads. This doesn’t necessarily mean, however, that the team with the most Quad 1 wins will be the top overall seed. While that could be the case and might even be likely, the committee will still use other selection criteria just like it has in the past.
Strength of schedule, NET ranking, head-to-head, overall record and competitiveness in losses, plus the committee members’ own experience of watching teams play all season, are still among the considerations they will use to evaluate each school.
What does good look like?
The South Carolina example from last year is a good place to start. Most teams, of course, aren’t as dominant as last year’s Gamecocks. That 12-0 version of South Carolina might be difficult to duplicate but getting to double-digit Quad 1 wins will make a good case nearly every year for being a No. 1 seed.
Since the men have been using this system for seven years, they provide some historical examples. The top three in Quad 1 wins for the men last season were top seeds: Houston, UConn and Purdue. North Carolina was the fourth No. 1 and had 10 Quad 1 wins. But, like the entire selection process, there is no one set rule. Each year has different teams and circumstances.
Again using the men’s tournament as an example, the Houston men in 2023 failed to hit double-figure Quad 1 wins (8-3) yet earned a top seed. The Cougars were, however, 31-3 overall and the top NET-rated team, showcasing that Quad 1 wins will be important but won’t be the only criteria applied.
All the women’s No. 1 and No. 2 seeds from the 2024 NCAA tournament reached double-digit Quad 1 wins. Had the quad system been used last season on the women’s side, the No. 1 seeds likely would have remained the same.
Which teams are set up for success with the new quad system?
That doesn’t change. Teams that schedule well — play an abundance of Quad 1 games — and win games against that schedule, will continue to receive the best seeds. The mission is the same whether the criteria are NET wins or record against Quad 1 and 2 opponents: play and beat other good teams.
UConn plays Notre Dame, Iowa State, USC and South Carolina — all projected top-10 teams — among its nonconference opponents.
The SEC and Big Ten should be the deepest conferences, which will give South Carolina, LSU, Texas, USC, UCLA and Ohio State plenty of opportunities to rack up impressive Quad 1 records.
That all sounds familiar. The quad system changes none of it.
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