Typically, the madness of March refers to the hectic nature of tournament basketball. However, today it also described an odd and premature NCAA bracket reveal.
A mid-afternoon mistake by ESPN in which the women’s brackets were shown early sent sports media into a frenzy as seeding was revealed hours before schedule.
"It was very unfortunate," said Texas A&M coach Gary Blair. "A selection show is everything. Teams want to be able to have that celebration, especially the at-large teams and bubble teams."
The leak revealed, to the satisfaction of Aggie fans, that Texas A&M had secured a much desired four seed in the Chicago region. The Aggies are set to host 13th-seeded Wright State at 3 p.m. on Friday, a game that will be televised on ESPN2.
“The Aggies are set to host 13 seed Wright State at 3 pm which will be televised on ESPN 2. With a win on Friday, A&M would prepare to host the winner of 12 seed Rice and five seed Marquette on Sunday.”
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With a win on Friday, A&M would prepare to host the winner of 12 seed Rice and five seed Marquette on Sunday. A second weekend win likely would have the Aggies in a rematch of last year’s Sweet Sixteen, where they lost to the eventual NCAA champion Notre Dame 90-84. The Irish are again a one seed after finishing the year with an impressive 30-3 record.
A&M had their eyes set on a top four seed all season, knowing the benefit that home-court advantage has in a tournament format.
“It’s big. Being able to host means a lot to me,” said A&M guard Chennedy Carter, who led the SEC in scoring. “We hosted last year, and that was one of the reasons we were able to pull through and beat a ranked team in DePaul.”
Carter’s three pointer with 2.8 seconds to play in last year’s round of 32 helped lift the fourth-seeded Aggies over fifth-seeded DePaul 80-79 for a trip to the Sweet Sixteen.
Kayla Wells echoed the importance of playing at home.
“It makes it easier because we know we have our fans behind us cheering us on,” Wells explained. “Without our fans last year against DePaul, we wouldn’t have been able to come back and win that game.”
In addition to the good fortune of playing at home, the Aggies are welcoming back their leader in Carter, who missed the conference tournament with an injured pinky finger. Coach Blair said she looks healthy and will be ready to compete.
“She’s got to get some confidence shooting the ball, but she looked 100% in practice.”
In Carter’s absence, Texas A&M was advanced to the semi-finals of the SEC tournament on a Kayla Wells game-winner against Auburn.
“We know Chennedy (Carter) is the best player on our team. We proved that we’re just as good without her because we’re a team. We shocked a lot of people,” said Wells.
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