February 22, 2025
Locked On Women’s Basketball: Ranking the national championship contenders
By The Next
Lincoln Shafer: 'There's maybe five teams for me that I think could win the title'
In the latest episode of Locked On Women’s Basketball, Hunter Cruse, Emily Adler and Lincoln Shafer discuss which teams could win a national championship in Tampa, Florida, in April.
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Adler starts by bringing up a matchup she’d love to see between Notre Dame and UCLA, which are currently ranked first and third in the AP poll:
“Not only are they the two best teams in the country, pretty solidly, but they’re also just different enough in ways that I think makes for a really fun game, and not just in, like, ‘Hey, dump it in to Lauren Betts; she’ll get 25 and 15 or whatever.’ Because … [Notre Dame’s post defense] can hold up there. [And] UCLA’s guard defenses are … competitive enough to make that an interesting matchup.
“Obviously we’ve already seen UConn-Notre Dame. Give me UConn-UCLA along the way, please. And I think that’s probably the three teams that I could see winning the title.”
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Shafer talks about a broader group of national championship contenders, all of whom are currently ranked in the top six of the AP poll:
“There’s maybe five teams for me that I think could win the title right now. UCLA and Notre Dame are the top tier for me. And then UConn, who has maybe the best player in the country [in Paige Bueckers] and probably the best freshman in the country [in Sarah Strong]. …
“And then both USCs, to me, are still kind of in title contention, because JuJu [Watkins] could do anything and beat anyone by herself. And South Carolina still has the best defense in the country and still has like nine rotation players that won a title before. Maybe Tessa Johnson turns it on in the tournament again. I don’t feel comfortable counting them out at this point.”
The trio also talks about the odds for No. 2 Texas, No. 7 LSU and even some teams further down the top 25 to win the national championship.
Related reading:
- Sights and sounds from a crosstown, top-10 matchup in Los Angeles
- Has UConn’s series with South Carolina evolved into a rivalry?
- SEC notebook: Can Texas break away from South Carolina and LSU as the SEC’s best?
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