A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:
March Madness is here. The brackets for the men's and women's Division I college basketball tournaments were set yesterday, and NPR sports correspondent Becky Sullivan tirelessly is going over the brackets, and she's here to give us a closer look. Now, the headline for the men's bracket is that 14 of the 68 teams are all from one conference. That's a record.
BECKY SULLIVAN, BYLINE: It is a record, in fact, yeah. I think college sports fans are used to the SEC dominating in football. Now the SEC, the Southeastern Conference, is on top of basketball, too, A. This was a - they were hailed all season long as the strongest conference, and now they are sending, as you say, 14 teams. That's a record. It's all but two teams in the entire conference are going to the big dance, including two of the tournament's No. 1 seeds - top overall seed Auburn and then Florida, who came on hot to finish the season I think will be a very popular pick for national champion. And so just a tour de force there.
MARTÍNEZ: Yeah. And Duke is another No. 1 seed. Duke is Duke - I remember someone saying that. Now, a lot of other perennial contenders and recent champions, though, didn't do so well this year.
SULLIVAN: Yeah. So I think there's a lot of familiar names that are kind of middling seeds this year, including Kansas, UConn, North Carolina. All of them reached the championship game in the last few years, but all of them seeded 7 or lower, and then a couple of other recent champs in Virginia and Vilanova, who missed the tournament entirely. Kind of a topsy-turvy year, I would say, in college basketball as college sports undergo these changes we've been talking about a lot with players getting paid, transferring freely, that kind of thing. And so you have these long-time college basketball coaches who have retired, their schools have struggled to sort of transition. And so, as a result, it really feels like the upside of that being a year where there could be a first-time champion or teams reaching those - the final four for the first time in school history, which I think is very cool.
MARTÍNEZ: All right, now, the women's bracket, which - I'm looking at both brackets. This one, to me, is the juicier one in terms of possible final four matchups. The top of the overall team is at UCLA.
SULLIVAN: Yeah. And I think UCLA - now, that's a name that used to be synonymous with men's college basketball. But actually, the women's team has never reached the final four. So this is the best season in school history. Very exciting there. Lots of contenders, though, including, of course, South Carolina, led by head coach Dawn Staley, who is an icon in this sport. Last year, they went undefeated, including the national title. But this year, not quite so invincible. The other top two seeds are Southern California and Texas.
And as you say, I just think, you know, women's basketball right now has so many electric stars that sort of drive interest in the game. You have JuJu Watkins with the Trojans, you have Flau'jae Johnson at LSU, Paige Bueckers with UConn. UCLA have this pair of stars in Lauren Betts and Kiki Rice. All of them are a treat to watch, no matter who they're playing. It's going to be really exciting to see some of those Goliath versus Goliath matchups once we get a little further into the tournament.
MARTÍNEZ: Yeah. UCLA has only lost twice this season, both times to USC, their crosstown rival. I hope they meet up somehow in the final four. OK, so for people that might be trying to fill out their brackets today, give us some help, Becky. Who do you see as a Cinderella?
SULLIVAN: Well, in the men's tournament, I think important to point out for people filling out their brackets that an 11-seed has won a first-round game over a 6-seed in all of the past 20 tournaments. So I think you should pick at least one. I think this year, the trendiest pick will certainly be Drake over Missouri. Drake, first-time DI head coach in Ben McCollum, who came from Northwest Missouri State where he led that team to four Division II national titles. They have a great defense. I'm also intrigued by UC San Diego, who recently moved up to DI, and they come into the dance on a 15-game-winning streak.
MARTÍNEZ: All right, what about the women's?
SULLIVAN: Well, in the women's, I think there aren't really Cinderellas in the same way there are in the men's, but if you want to go for one, I think 6-seed Iowa could be frisky, who pulled off a win over USC earlier this season. So even though they no longer have that superstar Caitlin Clark, who is in the WNBA, they still have a lot of tournament experience.
MARTÍNEZ: All right, that's NPR's Becky Sullivan. Becky, thanks.
SULLIVAN: You're welcome.
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