Selection Sunday has arrived with the Virginia Tech Women's Basketball awaiting their seeding after winning the ACC regular season title and going 24-7 this past season.
The Hokies were in the hunt to earn a 1 seed for the second-straight before things went awary over the final few weeks of the season with a loss to Notre Dame on the road followed by now three-time ACC Player of the Year Liz Kitley suffering an injury, and the Hokies losing two of their last three games (UVA and Notre Dame in the ACC Tournament).
Kitley's status remains unknown at this time, with the most recent public comments on her status coming after the Hokies' ACC Tournament quarterfinal victory over Miami where she was ruled out of the ACC Tournament, but Kenny Brooks said that they would "reevalute next week." Since then, we have not heard any further about Kitley's status though answers could possibly come this evening with Brooks set to speak with the media following the bracket reveal.
Now, the Hokies are looking at a 3 or 4 seed, with Tech wisely staying mum on the status of Kitley knowing that if Kitley is out and that news was public, the committee has latitude to drop the Hokies down a seed line accordingly. Notre Dame did the same thing last season when Olivia Miles suffered a season-ending injury, but the Irish did not reveal the extent of her injury till after the brackets came out, leading to the Irish holding onto a three seed.
One thing that should also help Tech is the fact that they did beat a Miami team that should make the NCAA Tournament without Liz Kitley to help them do so.
So with that said, here are where various bracketologists have the Hokies projected hours ahead of the bracket reveal.
- ESPN: 4 seed
- CBS Sports: 4 seed
- The Athletic: 4 seed
- Her Hoop Stats: 4 seed
- College Sports Madness: 4 seed
A four seed has been the popular projection for the past week as the Hokies have that ACC regular season title and plenty of quality victories, but their NET of 19 may hold them back from getting to a 3 seed. If we knew Liz Kitley was going to be healthy, the math may change for how the committee evaluates the Hokies, but a four seed seems likely.
That four seed is also the cut line for getting to host your first and second round matchups, something that is quite important and why Tech has gone radio silent on the status of Kitley. If would be a serious wrong if the committee were to take away that hosting opportunity, but the committee does have the latitude within their rules to do that when factoring injuries in.
Whether Tech is a four seed or not, the Hokies are certain to face a tougher challenge in the first and the second round now than you would have thought just a few weeks ago. There are plenty of dangerous mid-major conference champions who will could into that 13 seed spot who could challenge the Hokies including fellow in-state program Richmond along with top 25 MAAC champion Fairfield who only has one loss, but has played a brutally weak schedule and has a poor NET ranking.
The 5 seed line could present some difficult matchups for the Hokies as well in a prospective second round matchup. If the Hokies are without Kitley, then the potential 5 seed that Tech likely would want to avoid the most is Utah who has one of the best bigs in the country in Alissa Pili, the 2022-23 Pac-12 Player of the Year who has averaged over 20 points per game each of the past two seasons.
The madness is upon us with the Hokies likely to host the first and second rounds of the NCAA Women's Tournament for the second-straight year and only the third time in program history. All that awaits now is the formal bracket reveal in just a few hours.
