As the 2024/25 NCAA basketball Selection Sunday looms, the Ivy League is tipping off its two-day conference tournament on Friday, with an automatic ticket to March Madness on the line in Saturday's championship game.

Compared to behemoths like the 18-team ACC and Big Ten, the small eight-school conference sent two squads to 2024 NCAA tournament, where Columbia fell in the First Four before West Virginia defeated Princeton in the first round.

This year, Ivy League No. 1-seed Columbia took the conference's outright regular-season title with a 13-1 league record, while the No. 2-seed Princeton Tigers and No. 3-seed Harvard Crimson also posted winning runs, following the Lions with respective 12-2 and 11-3 Ivy resumes.

Only half of the league's eight teams make the conference showdown, and the Penn Quakers eked out the No. 4-seed spot on a tiebreaker, clinching their sixth Ivy League tournament berth after finishing the season locked up with the Brown Bears.

Columbia's Fliss Henderson and Cecelia Collins box out Vanderbilt's Justine Pissott during their 2024 NCAA Tournament First Four game.
Ivy League top-seed Columbia are hunting their second-ever NCAA tournament appearance.(Ryan Hunt/Getty Images)

Columbia looks to stay atop Ivy League entering March Madness

Princeton has dominated the Ivy in recent years, earning 11 March Madness trips in the NCAA tournament's last 14 iterations and making two national second-round appearances behind now-UConn starter Kaitlyn Chen.

However, Columbia is the conference favorite this year, with the Lions taking aim at their second-ever NCAA tournament appearance.

Columbia's first March Madness trip came just last year, buoyed by the team's all-time leading scorer and the program's first-ever WNBA draftee, Connecticut Sun guard Abbey Hsu.

While the Lions are expected to take this weekend's title, booking a likely NCAA tournament No. 11 seed alongside the Ivy League's automatic bid, ESPN’s Bracketology currently has the conference fielding three teams in the national bracket — both Princeton and Harvard are predicted to snag one of the final four at-large spots on Sunday.

All in all, breaking into the outer margins of the NCAA tournament bracket is no small feat, but March Madness rests on the premise that even the smallest conferences can change the game with a single upset.

Harvard's Harmoni Turner defends Columbia's Fliss Henderson during a 2024 Ivy League tournament semifinal.
Along with Princeton, both Harvard and Columbia could make March Madness. (Gregory Fisher/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

How to watch the 2025 Ivy League conference tournament

No. 1-seed Columbia will tips off Friday's semifinals against No. 4 Penn at 4:30 PM ET, before No. 2 Princeton and No. 3 Harvard battle at 7:30 PM ET.

The winners will face-off for the conference title and the Ivy League's automatic March Madness bid on Saturday at 5:30 PM ET.

Both Friday semifinals will air live on ESPN+, with ESPNU broadcasting Saturday's championship game.

The fourth-annual FIBA 3×3 AmeriCup tips off Thursday in Puerto Rico,​ with 2022 winners Canada and three-time silver medalists Brazil aiming to dethrone defending three-time champs Team USA.

The US is led by three WNBA standouts. Veteran Mystics guard Brittney Sykes's 12.2 points per game was second on Washington's 2024 roster, while Sparks forward Azurá Stevens is strong on both ends of the court as LA's best three-point shooter also boasts the team's second-best rebound rate.

Meanwhile, Dallas Wings forward Maddy Siegrist is coming off a shooting hot streak, sinking over 50% from the field in her second WNBA season.

Former record-breaking Ivy League sharpshooter Abbey Hsu rounds out Team USA's roster, with the Belgian league rookie​ earning the spot over nine WNBA players.

FIBA 3×3 AmeriCup player and LA Sparks forward Azurá Stevens shoots the ball during a game.
LA Sparks forward Azurá Stevens will compete with Team USA's 3×3 team starting Saturday. (Sam Hodde/Getty Images)

The road to the 3×3 podium

Fifteen teams traveled to San Juan, Puerto Rico, but only 12 will compete in the tournament's main draw. Thursday's court is reserved for the four teams vying to qualify, with either Guatemala, Cuba, Costa Rica, or the Cayman Islands surviving.

With the 12 tournament teams split into four groups of three, pool play takes over on Friday and Saturday. Pools B (Canada, Mexico, and Jamaica) and D (Puerto Rico, Argentina, and the final qualifying team) will play their round-robin round on Friday. Then, Pools A (USA, Uruguay, and the Dominican Republic) and C (Chile, Brazil, and Colombia) will do the same on Saturday.

The top two teams from each pool will advance to Sunday's knockout rounds. All elimination games will feature on Sunday's court, including the quarterfinals, semifinals, third-place game, and championship showdown.

How to watch Team USA in the 2024 FIBA 3×3AmeriCup

The tournament tips off at 12:30 PM ET on Thursday, but Team USA doesn't feature until Saturday, when they face the Dominican Republic at 3:30 PM ET before taking on Uruguay at 6:35 PM ET.

All FIBA 3×3 AmeriCup games — including Sunday's 8 PM ET championship — will stream live on YouTube.

LSU star Angel Reese headlines the roster for USA Basketball’s 2023 AmeriCup team, revealed Thursday.

Joining Reese are South Carolina’s Raven Johnson, UCLA’s Lauren Betts and Tennessee’s Rickea Jackson, among others. Eight players made the initial roster announced in May, and Texas A&M’s Janiah Barker, Oregon’s Chance Gray, Columbia’s Abbey Hsu and UNC’s Deja Kelly — were added to the roster after being invited to training camp.

Of the 12 players on the roster, five of them — Barker, Betts, Jackson, UCLA’s Charisma Osborne and Wake Forest’s Jewel Spear — have a combined seven gold medals as members of USA Basketball teams.

Reese, though, will be competing internationally for the first time. The 2023 NCAA champion faced a long road to USA Basketball. While she had been a finalist for a variety of youth teams, she hadn’t made the cut until this time around.

“NEVER GIVE UP ON THINGS YOU WANT IN LIFE,” she wrote in May. “TIME TO BRING HOME GOLD.”

The tournament will run from July 1-9 in León, Mexico. Held every two years, the AmeriCup features teams from 10 different countries in North America, South America and the Caribbean. The United States has won the title four times, including at the last two tournaments in 2019 and 2021.

Team USA will compete in Group A against Argentina, Brazil, Cuba and Venezuela. Group play starts on July 1.

2023 FIBA Women’s AmeriCup: Team USA schedule

  • Group stage
    • July 1 vs. Venezuela — 4:40 p.m. ET
    • July 2 vs. Argentina — 4:40 p.m. ET
    • July 4 vs. Brazil — 4:40 p.m. ET
    • July 5 vs. Cuba @ 2:10 p.m. ET
  • Knockout stage
    • July 7: Quarterfinals
    • July 8: Semifinals
    • July 9: Medal games

2023 FIBA Women’s AmeriCup: Broadcast information

All 28 AmeriCup games will be available via streaming platform Courtside 1891.

2023 FIBA Women’s AmeriCup: Team USA roster

  • Janiah Barker, F, Texas A&M
  • Lauren Betts, C, UCLA
  • Chance Gray, G, Oregon
  • Abbey Hsu, G, Columbia
  • Rickea Jackson, F, Tennessee
  • Raven Johnson, G, South Carolina
  • Deja Kelly, G, North Carolina
  • Rayah Marshall, G, Southern California
  • Charisma Osborne, G, UCLA
  • Laila Phelia, G, Michigan
  • Angel Reese, F, LSU
  • Jewel Spear, G, Wake Forest