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This is South Carolina’s Aliyah Boston, the author of her own story

(Eakin Howard/Getty Images)

If you had a TV, a phone or a computer in April 2021, you saw it.

Aliyah Boston certainly did. She lived it, and then she watched as it was played over and over and over again.

Thirty-nine minutes and 59 seconds of basketball had been played before Boston’s putback in the 2021 Final Four against Stanford bounced off the rim, but that moment, one that took place in less than a second, became the defining moment of her season. Never mind that the sophomore averaged 13.7 points, 11.5 rebounds, 2.6 blocks, 1.6 assists and 1.2 steals per game. Never mind that she led her team to a 26-5 record and the Final Four.

The moment was taken and twisted into a narrative that said: “This is Aliyah Boston.”

And it only went away because she forced it to. Boston had to win Player of the Year, Defensive Player of the Year and a national championship in 2022 for the narrative to shift. But the fixation on certain moments still hasn’t gone away. This season, it’s her stat line. Never mind who she’s playing with. Never mind the undefeated record. Never mind the fact that South Carolina is the favorite to win the title once more. Now, it’s a string of numbers slapped next to her name that show a dip from last season. They are taken to say: “This is Aliyah Boston.”

But the problem with reducing someone to a single moment is that you miss out on the details.

As the shot was replayed on TV and reposted on social media, Aliyah got lost. In the constant discussions of stats and skills and awards, Aliyah once again gets lost.

And there is so much more to her.

There was then, and there is now.

No single play — good or bad — can define her.

The shot and the stats, like every moment of her career, are part of her story, but they’re not the story.

She is.

***

There are only two things in Boston’s life that get her up before the sun: God and basketball.

Growing up in St. Thomas on the Virgin Islands, Boston practiced on outdoor courts. In order to avoid the heat, she and sister Alexis would get up in the dark and at 6 a.m. would head to the court, where they would practice until 8. The girls were happy to do it, but sometimes it took their mom Cleone’s coaxing to get them out of bed.

“It was tiring. We were, like, 9 and 10 years old. Like, are you kidding me?” Aliyah says with a laugh. “But it was fun.”

When they got home, their dad Al would make breakfast, usually eggs, bread and sausages. “He makes them so good,” Aliyah says.

And finally, with new basketball skills and full bellies, the girls would go back to bed.

The routine changed once a week because Sunday School was the priority, so the girls would go before they started practice. Cleone and Al grew up with God in their hearts, and they wanted the same for their daughters. That relationship, Cleone says, is the most important one a person can have.

So even when Aliyah and Alexis left St. Thomas and moved to Worcester, Mass. to live with their aunt, religion remained at the center of their lives. Things were changing for the girls, but that would not. They tried to do family devotions together, over the phone in the evenings, but sometimes schedules wouldn’t align. When that happened, the girls, then 12 and 13, would get up at 5 a.m.

“That was not always so uplifting for them,” Cleone laughs. “But we needed them to know that that is the foundation. Whatever you want to do in life is not possible without Him.”

When the girls were little, they had no choice in the matter. Like most kids, their parents made all the decisions. But they had to grow up quickly in Worcester. They still had family supervision, but their parents had less say in their daily lives. Even then, they chose to continue the religious foundation Al and Cleone instilled in them, and today, when Aliyah credits God in her interviews, it makes Cleone’s heart swell with joy.

But it wasn’t all warm and fuzzy. The move was hard on everyone, and the Bostons made it work the best they could by talking on the phone — not just texting — every day. Even now, Aliyah loves to FaceTime. Seeing the people in her life is just as important to her as hearing their voices.

If Al or Cleone missed their daughters too much, they knew Aliyah and Alexis were just a plane ride — or two or three, depending on the amount of connecting flights — away.

“We always had space on our credit card for at least one flight,” Cleone says.

These days, Aliyah treasures her own visits to St. Thomas. No matter how comfortable she got in Massachusetts, or how much she loves South Carolina, St. Thomas is always home. After her parents and her dad’s cooking, the thing she misses the most is the water.

“I’m a beach girl,” she says.

By the time Aliyah made the move to Massachusetts, she was already a bonafide star. The Bostons never dreamed Aliyah would be winning national awards and championships, or signing NIL deals with companies like Crocs and Orangetheory. To them, the dream was always to use basketball as a way to earn a college scholarship.

The move helped with that.

Once Aliyah started playing AAU, Cleone would call her and ask who she was playing. Every time, Aliyah had the same answer: “I don’t know.”

To her, the name of the opponents didn’t matter. Aliyah was just playing basketball, and if she played the way she knew how, the way she always did, she would be successful. It wasn’t that she was cocky — Cleone wants that to be clear. Her daughter just had an inherent self-belief that she could do anything.

During one of those games where Aliyah didn’t know her opponent, Cleone had flown in to watch. As they walked into the gym, Aliyah realized she’d left her jersey in the car and ran back out to the parking lot to retrieve it. As she sprinted away, her mom heard the chatter in the gym: “That’s her. That’s the girl!”

“When she came back I said, ‘You may not know who you are playing, but guess what? Those girls know who the hell you are,’” Cleone says now with a laugh.

***

Aliyah has always cared deeply and desperately for the people around her. Even those she doesn’t know.

“You can never say Aliyah has been nasty to someone,” says Stanford player and close friend Haley Jones. “She’s always everyone’s biggest fan.”

During games, she likes to “chop it up” with opponents. You won’t find her trash-talking, unless it’s lighthearted banter with one of her friends on an opposing team. Instead, she typically makes conversation.

“She is chatting, especially when we play against each other. Our teammates will be like, ‘Will y’all shut up?” Jones says with a laugh.

Aliyah is the kind of person to seek opponents out after a game. If they played well, it’s to congratulate them. If they didn’t, she offers encouragement. And on her own squad, Aliyah always puts her teammates first. She knows every player’s in-game assignment as well as she knows her own. She knows how her teammates are feeling, and what they are going through.

Mistakes are her responsibility. Losses are her responsibility. Even when they shouldn’t be.

“If things aren’t going well or if the team loses, she takes that on,” Cleone says.

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Boston embraces Angel Reese after South Carolina beat LSU on Feb. 12. (Lance King/Getty Images)

When South Carolina played one of its closest games of the season, a 64-57 overtime win over Ole Miss on Feb. 19, Aliyah finished with a double-double. Her 13 points, 12 rebounds and three assists were a big reason the Gamecocks came away with a victory. But as the last minute of regulation ticked down, she missed three free throws in a row.

The first thing Aliyah did when she got off the court was type a message in her family group chat: “Sorry I missed those free throws,” she wrote.

Never mind that she made the one that counted, forcing overtime and allowing her team to win in the extra frame. The mistakes were the first thing she held onto, because of what they could have caused.

For Aliyah, the idea of letting her people down, even if it’s just based on her own perception, is almost too much to bear.

Cleone tells a story about Aliyah and Alexis, back when the girls were in first and second grade, living in St. Thomas. She took them to the park, and Alexis, the older sister, had lent her bike to a little boy who didn’t have one. Cleone sat on a bench with the other parents and watched. Alexis became unhappy seeing the boy playing with her bike. Finally, she decided she wanted it back, but she didn’t want to ask for it. Alexis felt bad, but Aliyah didn’t. Her sister wanted her bike, so she would get it.

“I went over and got it,” Aliyah says. “I could have just minded my business, but I didn’t because she wanted her bike back.”

But if the boy was playing with Aliyah’s bike, they know it would have been different.

“I probably would have just let him have it,” she says.

***

Aliyah fell into a crouch. She planted her palms to the floor and let her head drop, her blue and yellow braids cascading down around her face.

South Carolina had just lost to Stanford in the 2021 Final Four, and Aliyah had missed the final shot attempt, one that would have lifted the Gamecocks to a one-point victory at the buzzer. Instead, they fell 66-65 and would be going home.

As cameras zoomed in on her crying, they captured a moment that would dominate headlines, photos and tweets surrounding the game. But they missed the truth.

Aliyah wasn’t crying because she missed the shot. She was crying because her team lost. And she knew how hurt they would all be.

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(C. Morgan Engel/NCAA Photos via Getty Images)
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(Elsa/Getty Images)

Like the text to her family after the Ole Miss game, and like her quest to reclaim her sister’s bike, she was never the motivation. They were.

That is why she cried. Not for her, but for them. Aliyah took it all on.

Jones was on the other side of the shot. She celebrated the win with Stanford as Aliyah and South Carolina were in agony over defeat.

“Forty minutes happened before that shot,” Jones says, shaking her head. Nearly two years later, she’s still visibly irritated about what her friend went through.

Aliyah finished with 11 points, 16 rebounds and four blocks. South Carolina missed 42 other shots, but Aliyah’s was all anyone could talk about. Everywhere they looked, Al and Cleone saw their daughter’s crying face.

“I’d never seen anything run on TV so much,” Cleone says. “I told my husband, ‘Her tears are going to be famous.’”

***

After that, Aliyah and coach Dawn Staley made a pact. They would “turn her frown upside down.” Aliyah would have a season so exceedingly dominant that every media outlet in the country would have no choice but to replace the photo of her crying with one of her beaming with joy.

And she did.

Aliyah won 2021-22 Player of the Year and Defensive Player of the Year. Then, she led South Carolina to a national title, the second in program history.

The narrative shifted because she forced it to. But as quickly as those tears became smiles, the praise became criticism once more.

This season, it’s Aliyah’s stat line that’s being brandished against her — 13.3 points, 9.7 rebounds, 2.0 blocks and 1.8 assists per game. Those numbers are lower than her production last season, and are compared to the season averages of players like Caitlin Clark of Iowa (27 points, 8.3 assists, 7.5 rebounds) and Angel Reese of LSU (23.4 points, 15.5 rebounds).

“If you put things into context, Aliyah is playing with other All-Americans on her team,” Jones says. “She doesn’t have to carry her team, but put her in a scenario that she needs to, and best believe she will.”

Look at any social media post about Player of the Year candidates this season, and you’ll notice a theme. Most players have defenders in the comments, pleading their cases. Aliyah has those, too, but she also has critics. They make sure to lay out all the reasons that she shouldn’t win. There are so many that it’s impossible to miss, such as in a March 4 tweet about the Wooden Award finalists:

“Typical ESPN bias promoting Boston over everyone else.”

“Aliyah Boston is the most overrated player in all of sports. Her numbers are average. She wins awards because of her team/ coach.”

“Undeserving. Enough said.”

Aliyah is aware of these kinds of comments. Especially when the Twitter trolls go out of their way to tag her, ensuring that Aliyah sees their hate.

And sometimes, she wants to respond. Just for a moment, she thinks, she might control the narrative once more.

But she never does.

“Not every battle is for me to fight,” she says. “I learned that in the past, especially last year. I just have to live the truth of what is for me is for me.”

That doesn’t mean she isn’t tempted. But when she is, Cleone is there to remind her to leave it alone.

“People will bait you,” Cleone says. “People put things out there just to get you involved. And sometimes the best way to argue with a fool is to say nothing at all.”

And if the comments are bad enough that they need a response, there’s always someone to stick up for Aliyah so she doesn’t have to stick up for herself: Dawn Staley.

South Carolina’s head coach is Aliyah’s fiercest protector. There’s no battle she won’t fight for her senior.

When the crying photo was being posted over and over, Staley tweeted several pictures of Aliyah for media outlets to use as replacements.

When Aliyah wasn’t invited to the ESPYs last year, despite being nominated for an award, Staley spoke out.

And now, when people criticize Aliyah’s numbers, Staley has more words.

“There’s not anyone in the country that produces like she produces on both sides of the basketball,” she told reporters after South Carolina beat then-No. 3 LSU in February. “Nobody. She is the best player in the country.”

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Boston and Dawn Staley pose with the 2023 SEC regular season championship trophy, their third together. (Jeff Blake/USA TODAY Sports)

The shot didn’t change Aliyah, and the constant conversation around her stat line won’t either. She’s always been steadfastly herself, from the braids to the colorful crocs she wears.

South Carolina and Staley changed her, though. For the better.

Aliyah came in as a shy freshman, and by her sophomore year she had been named a team captain. Her coaches asked her to be more of a leader, so she worked at it every day. Coming to South Carolina, Aliyah says, is the best thing she ever did. Her teammates, Staley and the program have made Aliyah even more herself.

“She never had to dress like someone else or have what someone else had to be comfortable,” Cleone says. “She was always comfortable in who she is. And that has never changed. But she has grown and she has gotten even more confident in who she is as a person.”

Despite Cleone’s insistence that Aliyah not respond to hate, she does. Just in her own way, one that Cleone can be proud of.

Every day that Aliyah holds her head high is a response. Every game where she succeeds, and even ones where she struggles, Aliyah is responding. She’s responding by being herself, by living life her own way. It’s allowed her to wade through criticism and become a fixture in the game. Aliyah is projected as the No. 1 pick in the 2023 WNBA draft. When you think of women’s college basketball, it’s hard not to think of the South Carolina star.

But like turning the frown upside down, Aliyah had to make that happen. She had to be so good that she could not be ignored.

Last season, in addition to her POY and DPOY awards, Aliyah was named SEC Player of the Year, SEC Defensive Player of the Year, the Wade Trophy winner, the Associated Press Player of the Year, the Lisa Leslie Award winner, the Final Four Most Outstanding Player and a national champion.

She became the face of the sport.

And yet, with every award, every record, every great game, there are prominent voices trying to knock her back down.

“They can always find a positive when it’s someone else, even if they have a bad game,” Cleone says. “But for Aliyah it’s, ‘Oh, Boston doesn’t perform anymore. They won, but she was nowhere to be found.’”

Aliyah is careful when addressing this point. She knows it’s easy for people to take her words and twist them.

But she also knows the realities of being a Black woman in the spotlight. And when it comes to her representing women’s college basketball, there are critics who would rather see someone else.

It’s a topic Staley discussed on her podcast NETLIFE during last year’s Player of the Year race, stating that the way Aliyah is portrayed in the media is “different” than the way other predominant players are covered.

“In terms of me being a Black woman, it’s not always what they want to put out,” Aliyah says. “It’s definitely hard in that matter because sometimes people have this specific image that they would rather see.”

Aliyah has learned that she can’t please everyone. She can’t be everything to everyone. There will always be people who don’t want her to succeed, and it’s hard to ignore them, but Aliyah knows those people don’t matter.

“You don’t have to be perfect for the people outside of your circle,” she says.

***

Cleone and Al may live far away, but they come to as many games as possible. Recently, they made the long journey from St. Thomas and settled into the stands for one of Aliyah’s games. They prepared to cheer for their daughter, only to hear opposing fans calling Aliyah and her teammates “thugs” and spewing other hateful rhetoric, unaware that her parents were sitting right next to them.

Aliyah responded, just like she always does — without saying anything. The senior posted up her opponent and executed a strong move, scoring with ease.

Cleone stood up.

“That one is mine!” she exclaimed with pride, loud enough for the whole section to hear.

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(Jeff Blake/USA TODAY Sports)

Aliyah’s circle will continue to support her, and others will continue to criticize. Through it all, Aliyah will continue to be Aliyah. She will keep wearing her hair in colorful braids. She will keep loving God. She will keep dominating on the basketball court, winning games and awards. She will keep uplifting those around her.

She will keep finding the joy in basketball, no matter what moments people choose to define her by.

They will talk about the shot, and the stats, and whatever else they can use to try to bring her down. But if you want to pick a moment that says, “This is Aliyah Boston,” plenty of others would be more apt.

Define her as the little sister who got her sibling’s bike back.

Define her as the daughter who talks to her parents on the phone every day.

Define her as the player who puts her teammates first, and the one who wants everyone to find success in life.

But however you define Aliyah Boston, remember this:

“The world cannot break my child,” Cleone says.

Aliyah is too strong to be broken. She shouldn’t have to be, but she is.

Eden Laase is a Staff Writer at Just Women’s Sports. Follow her on Twitter @eden_laase.

WNBA Preseason Games End as Teams Make Final 2025 Roster Cuts

Atlanta rookie Te-Hina Paopao drives down the court during a 2025 WNBA preseason game.
Atlanta Dream rookie Te-Hina PaoPao scored 14 points against Indiana on Saturday. (Adam Hagy/NBAE via Getty Images)

There's just one WNBA preseason game left on the 2025 calendar, as 12 of the league's 13 teams wrapped exhibition play over the weekend ahead of Friday's regular-season tip-off.

The Chicago Sky became the latest team to lock in their 12-player roster on Sunday, joining the likes of the Indiana Fever in making tough final cuts.

To reach league compliance, Chicago waived Australian guard Alex Wilson, 2024 second-round draft pick Jessika Carter (Mississippi State), and former Mercury forward Morgan Bertsch.

Earning their official spots in the Sky's lineup are 2025 rookies Hailey Van Lith (TCU) and Maddy Westbeld (Notre Dame), the overall No. 11 and No. 16 picks, respectively, in April's draft.

Overall, the class of 2025 is performing well so far, with all first-round picks avoiding early roster cuts — though many teams are still deciding who will suit up on opening day.

Some second-rounders are also showing significant promise, with the Atlanta Dream's 18th overall pick Te-Hina PaoPao (South Carolina) scoring a team-leading 14 points against Indiana on Saturday.

How to watch the final 2025 WNBA preseason game

Capping the 2025 WNBA preseason are the reigning champion New York Liberty, who will take on Japan's Toyota Antelopes on Monday night.

The exhibition will see Liberty stars Sabrina Ionescu and Nyara Sabally — who notably saw her contract extended through 2026 by New York on Monday afternoon — return to their University of Oregon alma mater for the clash.

The Liberty will tip off against the Antelopes at 10 PM ET, with live coverage airing on WNBA League Pass.

FIFA Expands 2031 Women’s World Cup Field, Sanctions Afghan Refugee Team

The attendance of 75,784 is shown above the 2023 World Cup semifinal between Australia and England.
The World Cup field will expand to 48 teams in 2031. (Mark Metcalfe - FIFA/FIFA via Getty Images)

The 2031 Women's World Cup will expand to 48 teams, with the 16-team increase announced among other landmark decisions by the FIFA Council on Friday.

The decision to expand the World Cup aims to "broaden representation, offering more nations and players access to elite competition and accelerating investment in women's football worldwide," according to the FIFA release.

"The FIFA Women's World Cup 2023, the first in which teams from all confederations won at least one game and teams from five confederations reached the knockout stage, among many other records, set a new standard for global competitiveness," said FIFA President Gianni Infantino.

"This decision ensures we are maintaining the momentum in terms of growing women’s football globally."

The expanded 2031 World Cup, hosted by the US, will adopt a 12-group format, increasing the total number of matches from 64 to 104 while extending the competition for an additional week.

The World Cup expansion announcement comes on the heels of last month's increased Olympic tournament news, with the IOC boosting the women's soccer field to 16 teams at the 2028 LA Games.

The decision also puts the women's competition in line with the men's World Cup, which will feature FIFA's first 48-team tournament in 2026.

Afghan women's soccer team founder and director Khalida Popal speaks at a 2023 event surrounded by the squad in Australia.
FIFA is creating an official refugee team for evacuated Afghan women's players. (Kelly Defina/Getty Images)

FIFA approves Afghan women's refugee team

In the same Friday announcement, the FIFA Council also approved the creation of an Afghanistan women's refugee team, which would provide evacuated Afghan women players the ability to compete on an officially recognized FIFA team.

While FIFA requires that national federations sponsor teams, the Afghan Football Federation ceased acknowledging its women's team once the Taliban-controlled government banned women's sports.

Originally formed by the country's Olympic Committee in 2007, the Afghanistan women's national team has not played a FIFA-recognized match since 2018, and most of its athletes fled the country amidst the Taliban's second takeover in 2021.

Since then, players have petitioned FIFA for the opportunity to compete. Their efforts earned a one-year trial phase from the governing body on Friday, though the success of the program could see it expanded to refugees from other nations in the future.

"We are happy that FIFA has created a pathway for Afghan players to finally return to the field," team founder and former captain Khalida Popal told CNN on Friday, adding that the squad "remain[s] hopeful FIFA can amend its statutes to provide official recognition for our players as the Afghanistan Women's National Team."

Popal — who helped hundreds of Afghans, including the team, escape the Taliban — previously said the team "could show the world that Afghan women and girls belong in sport, in school and everywhere in society — and we will not be defeated."

Unbeaten Chelsea FC Wins 2024/25 WSL Season

Millie Bright raises Chelsea's 2024/25 WSL trophy and celebrates with her teammates.
Chelsea's undefeated 2024/25 season is the winningest in WSL history. (Harriet Lander - Chelsea FC/Chelsea FC via Getty Images)

Chelsea FC is the first team in Women's Super League (WSL) history to claim an unbeaten 22-game season, adding the undefeated moniker to their sixth-straight league title with Saturday's 1-0 win over Liverpool.

The Blues' perfect season joins the previous unbeaten campaigns of 2012's Arsenal, 2016's Manchester City, and Chelsea's own 2018 squad — though those three teams did so in 14, 16, and 18 games, respectively.

Chelsea finishes the 2024/25 campaign with an astounding 19 wins and three draws, missing just six possible points on the table en route to their new WSL record of 60 points in a single season.

"As a manager, players, and staff, you only live these moments maybe once in your life," said Chelsea head coach Sonia Bompastor following Saturday's history-making win. "You need to enjoy it because it is a great achievement."

Trailing Chelsea's impressive winning tally by a full 12 points, Arsenal secured second place with a 4-3 victory over third-place Manchester United in their Saturday season finale.

Arsenal midfielder Mariona Caldentey poses with her 2024/25 WSL Player of the Season award.
The first-ever WSL Player of the Season award went to Arsenal's Mariona Caldentey. (Paul Harding - The FA/The FA via Getty Images)

WSL standouts secure individual 2024/25 awards

Though they missed the WSL's team trophy, the Gunners did claim some individual hardware this weekend, as voters selected midfielder Mariona Caldentey as the inaugural winner of the WSL Player of the Season award.

The 29-year-old Spain international led the league in shot creation, and put up nine goals and five assists on the WSL stat sheet this season.

Caldentey's teammate Alessia Russo also walked away with a trophy, sharing the Golden Boot with fourth-place Manchester City's Khadija "Bunny" Shaw after both forwards scored 12 goals each on the season.

Also sharing a stat-sheet title is Chelsea's Hannah Hampton and Manchester United's Phallon Tullis-Joyce, who claimed the 2024/25 WSL Golden Glove award behind 13 clean sheets apiece.

Meanwhile, the season's WSL Rising Star award went to ninth-place West Ham striker Shekiera Martinez. After spending the first half of the 2024/25 season on loan to Bundesliga side SC Freiburg, the 23-year-old German international notched an astounding 10 goals in her 12 total WSL matches.

Speaking of impressive scoring, Manchester City forward Vivianne Miedema's stellar chip against Aston Villa in January earned the Dutch star the 2024/25 WSL Goal of the Season title.

No. 1 Seed Texas A&M Tops NCAA Softball Tournament Bracket

Texas A&M softball teammates greet KK Dement at the plate after a home run during the 2025 SEC tournament.
No. 1-seed Texas A&M leads a record 14 SEC teams in the 2025 NCAA softball tournament bracket. (David Buono/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

For the first time in program history, Texas A&M is the No. 1 seed in the NCAA softball tournament, with the Aggies staving off four-time reigning champion Oklahoma for the honor in Sunday's 2025 bracket drop.

After adverse weather canceled their conference title game on Saturday, the Aggies and No. 2-seed Sooners became 2025 SEC tournament co-champions, leaving the NCAA selection committee to lean heavily on each team's strength of schedule in making their top-seed decision.

"What set apart Texas A&M is they have 19 Top 25 wins, which is number one in the country," said NCAA softball committee chair Kurt McGuffin on Sunday's ESPN2 broadcast, noting the Aggies' tough nonconference schedule.

Taking on a lighter nonconference slate than usual due to massive roster turnover following the 2023/24 season, Oklahoma relied heavily on their record in a stacked SEC, finishing one half-game ahead of A&M in regular-season play.

While the Sooners look to extend their championship streak, the Aggies will be hunting their third national title and first since 1987.

Standing in their way in the 64-team bracket are a record number of familiar foes, as the SEC boasts 14 teams in the 2025 NCAA competition — the most from any single conference in tournament history.

Even more, nine of the bracket's 16 seeded teams hail from the SEC, and a full seven of the Top 8.

Florida State catcher Michaela Edenfield celebrates a home run while rounding second base during a 2023 Women's College World Series game.
Florida State returns to the NCAA tournament as the highest seeded non-SEC team. (SARAH PHIPPS/THE OKLAHOMAN/USA TODAY NETWORK)

Conference champs, at-large teams score NCAA bracket spots

SEC squads aren't the only teams looking to topple Texas A&M and Oklahoma, however, as conference champions and other elite squads learned their tournament fates on Selection Sunday.

No. 5 Florida State is the highest seeded non-SEC team, despite falling 2-1 to No. 11-seed Clemson in Saturday's ACC title game. Along with No. 14-seed Duke, the ACC will see nine teams in the 2025 tournament.

Behind 2024 National Player of the Year NiJaree Canady — the nation's top pitcher — Texas Tech leads a five-team contingent from the Big 12 after securing both their conference tournament trophy and the national No. 12-seed this weekend.

In the weekend's most upset-filled conference tournament, unseeded Michigan outlasted both No. 9-seed UCLA and No. 16-seed Oregon to score a second straight Big Ten tournament title on Saturday, becoming one of eight teams repping the conference in Sunday's bracket.

Notably, the Bruins — the winningest program in NCAA softball history with 12 titles — have not entered the tournament lower than a No. 6 seed since 2016.

How to watch the 2025 NCAA softball tournament

The road to the 2025 Women's College World Series begins with Regionals, in which each of the 16 seeded teams will host a four-team double-elimination mini-tournament this weekend.

With a minimum of 96 games — and a possibility of 112 — Regional play begins at 12 PM ET on Friday, with the 64-team field narrowing to 16 by Sunday night.

All games will air live across ESPN's networks.

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