The women’s college basketball regular season has come to a close and now, we’re in tournament season, starting first with the various conference tournaments.
All 31 conference tournament champions will receive autobids to the NCAA Tournament, so a good showing can go a long way for many programs that aren’t amongst the Power 4 schools.
Last year, two programs earned bids through conference titles: High Point and UNC Greensboro
Here’s a look at all of North Carolina’s mid-major conference teams and how they’ve fared in their respective conference tournaments.
American Athletic Conference
In the American Athletic Conference, the ECU Pirates enter the conference tournament with the second best record at 14-4.
Due to that, the Pirates earned a triple bye all the way to the semifinals, then lost to UTSA.
For the Charlotte 49ers, they had to make their way through the entire bracket if they want to win a title after finishing with the eighth best conference record.
The 49ers lost their first round matchup on March 10 against Florida Atlantic.
Atlantic 10
The Davidson Wildcats fell in the semifinals of the Atlantic 10 tournament to top seeded Rhode Island, 55-46.
The Wildcats finished fourth in the A10 this season and had earned a bye to the quarterfinals. They won their first game of the tournament, 64-59 over Saint Joseph’s.
ASUN
Entering the ASUN tournament as the 11th seed, Queens University of Charlotte nearly pulled off an upset over sixth seed North Alabama, but ended up falling in the first round 57-55.
In their fourth year in Division I, Queens finished the year with a 4-15 conference record and a 10-21 record overall.
Big South
Top seeded High Point University are back-to-back Big South champions and will now earn an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.
The Panthers opened up tournament play in the quarterfinals against USC Upstate and then took down Winthrop and Radford en route to the title.
Despite losing three of their last six games heading into the tournament, including to both Radford and USC Upstate, High Point locked in for that final stretch and will now get to continue their season.
It’s the third Division I NCAA Tournament appearance for High Point.
Last year, High Point lost to William & Mary in the First Four.
As for the other two Big South representatives, the fourth seeded Gardner-Webb Runnin’ Bulldogs lost 64-52 to Winthrop in the quarterfinals and sixth seed UNC Asheville also lost in the quarterfinals to Longwood by a final score of 72-58.
CAA
The 2026 Coastal Athletic Association women’s basketball tournament ran from March 11 through March 15 and is North Carolina’s most well represented mid-major conference, with four different teams.
The Campbell Camels finished with the second best conference record and had a bye into the quarterfinals, where they lost to Hofstra.
Elon entered the tournament as the sixth seed beat Hampton in the second round before losing to Drexel. Ninth seed NC A&T lost to William & Mary also in the second round.
The conference’s bottom seed is represented by UNC Wilmington, who had just a 2-16 conference record this season. They’ll beat Northeastern in the lone first round matchup, then lost to five-seed Monmouth.
MEAC
The MEAC women’s conference tournament kicked off on March 11 and fifth seed NC Central fell to Coppin State.
Southern
In the Southern Conference, the two North Carolina teams wound up being the bottom two teams heading into the conference tournament and the results were about what was expected.
Western Carolina, who didn’t win a single conference game all season, lost 66-47 to top seeded Chattanooga and UNC Greensboro lost 62-50 to East Tennessee State.
It was definitely a disappointing season for the Spartans overall, who were unable to carry over some of their mojo from last season, when they were both the Southern Conference’s regular season and tournament champions.
Sun Belt
After a tough year, the Appalachian State Mountaineers entered the Sun Belt tournament with a 4-14 conference record and as the 13th seed.
They subsequently lost in the first round 68-57 to South Alabama.
