May 6 – New Haven announced that it had accepted an invite to join the Northeast Conference effective July 1, 2025, and begin reclassification from NCAA Division II to be eligible for postseason play in 2028–29.[1]
June 26 – The Atlantic Sun Conference (ASUN) and the Western Athletic Conference (WAC) announced a strategic alliance under which the WAC will rebrand as the United Athletic Conference (UAC) beginning with the 2026–27 academic year. The rebranding will allow the continuing conference to retain the WAC’s automatic qualification status for NCAA championship events, including basketball. Under the announced alignment:[5]
Going forward, the ASUN will retain its seven current members that do not play scholarship FCS football. Five of these schools do not sponsor football at all; Stetson plays non-scholarship FCS football in the Pioneer Football League, while Bellarmine plays the non-NCAA variant of sprint football.
July 21 – The American Athletic Conference announced it had dropped the word "Athletic" from its name, becoming simply the American Conference. The conference also retired the "AAC" initialism, which had been used more by media than by the conference itself; the official short form is now simply the word "American".[11]
September 24 – The Loyola Phoenix, the student newspaper of Loyola University Chicago, announced that 106-year-old Sister Jean, who began her tenure at Loyola in 1991, and had been chaplain of the men's basketball team since 1994,[14] retired for health reasons.[15]
October 2 – The Northeast Conference adopted its longstanding abbreviation of NEC as its official name.[16]
October 9 – Loyola Chicago announced that Sister Jean had died at the age of 106.[17]
October 31 – The WCC announced that Denver would join from the Summit League in 2026–27.[20]
January 14, 2026 – At the annual NCAA convention, the Division I Cabinet approved changes to the transfer portal for several sports, including men's and women's basketball. Effective immediately:[21]
A single 15-day portal was adopted for all D-I teams, opening the day after the final game of the NCAA tournament.
For players on teams undergoing a head coaching change, the portal will open for 15 days, starting 5 days after a new head coach is hired or publicly announced. If 30 days pass without the announcement of a new head coach, the portal will open for those players on the 31st day, as long as it falls after the championship game. This additional window is available only after the start of the standard portal.
Mid-year transfers will not be eligible to play for their new school during that season if they were enrolled at another NCAA member institution during the first academic term, regardless of whether or not they competed.
^While the NCAA requires that FBS conferences have eight full members that sponsor football at that level,[7] it only requires seven full members for official "multisport" status.[8] The reimagined Pac-12 reached that membership level in September 2024 when it announced Utah State as an incoming member.[9]
November 12 – Hannah Hidalgo set a single-game Division I record with 16 steals, as well as a school record of 44 points, in Notre Dame's 85–58 win over Akron.[22]
December 3 – Mikayla Blakes became the 9th player to score 1,000 career points in 42 or fewer games after dropping 28 points in Vanderbilt's 81–68 win over Virginia.[23]
January 22 – Hannah Hidalgo became the fastest women's basketball player in ACC history to reach 2,000 points, doing so in 86 games (the previous record was 89), after scoring 27 points in Notre Dame's 74–66 win over Miami (FL).[24]
February 14 – South Carolina coach Dawn Staley earned her 500th win as head coach of the Gamecocks following their 79–72 road win over LSU.[25]
A total of 6 schools joined new conferences for the 2025–26 season. Of these, 5 moved within Division I, 1 began reclassification from NCAA Division II.
St. Thomas left Schoenecker Arena after 44 seasons for the new Lee & Penny Anderson Arena. In the first half of a men's and women's doubleheader that officially opened the new arena on November 8, 2025, the Tommies women lost 67–61 to Army.[26]
An upset is a victory by an underdog team. In the context of NCAA Division I women's basketball, this generally constitutes an unranked team defeating a team currently ranked in the top 25. This list will highlight those upsets of ranked teams by unranked teams as well as upsets of No. 1 teams. Rankings are from the AP poll. Bold type indicates winning teams in "true road games"—i.e., those played on an opponent's home court (including secondary homes). Italics type indicates winning teams in an early season tournament (or event). Early season tournaments are tournaments played in the early season. Events are the tournaments with the same teams in it every year (even rivalry games).
In addition to the above listed upsets in which an unranked team defeated a ranked team, there have been ten non-Division I teams that defeated a Division I team so far this season. Bold type indicates winning teams in "true road games"—i.e., those played on an opponent's home court (including secondary homes). Italics type indicates winning teams in an early season tournament (or event). Early season tournaments are tournaments played in the early season. Events are the tournaments with the same teams in it every year (even rivalry games).
The NCAA tournament tipped off on March 18, 2026, with the First Four, and will conclude on April 5 at Mortgage Matchup Center in Phoenix, Arizona. A total of 68 teams entered the tournament. Thirty-one of the teams earned automatic bids by winning their conferences tournaments. The remaining 37 teams were granted "at-large" bids, which were extended by the NCAA Selection Committee.
After the NCAA tournament field is announced, the NCAA invites 32 teams to the Women's Basketball Invitation Tournament. The teams determined by the NCAA tournament selection committee to be the "first four out" of the NCAA tournament receive the top four seeds in the WBIT. Also, teams that won regular-season conference titles but did not receive NCAA tournament invitations, if otherwise eligible for NCAA-sponsored postseason play, receive automatic bids. All WBIT games through the quarterfinals are held at campus sites, with the semifinals and finals taking place in Wichita, Kansas at Charles Koch Arena.
After the NCAA tournament and WBIT fields are announced, the Women's National Invitation Tournament will invite 48 teams to participate. WNIT participants and sites will be announced when the field is set on March 16.
The NCAA has never recognized a consensus All-America team in women's basketball. This differs from the practice in men's basketball, in which the NCAA uses a combination of selections by the Associated Press (AP), the National Association of Basketball Coaches (NABC), The Sporting News and the United States Basketball Writers Association (USBWA) to determine a consensus All-America team. The selection of a consensus team is possible because all four organizations select at least a first and second team, with only the USBWA not selecting a third team.
Fernandez left USF on October 23, 2025, just 11 days before beginning his 26th season as head coach, to become head coach of the WNBA's Dallas Wings, which became official 4 days later.[42] Bulls associate head coach Woods-Baxter was named interim head coach for the 2025–26 season.[43]
VCU announced on February 2, 2026, that O'Boyle, who was in her 12th season as head coach of the program, will not have her contract renewed and that she would be relieved of her duties effective immediately. Rams assistant coach Crawford was named interim head coach for the rest of the season.[45]
^"Bylaw 20.02.8.1: Multisport Conference: Minimum Number of Members"(PDF). 2024–25 NCAA Division I Manual. NCAA. August 9, 2024. p. 358. Retrieved September 25, 2024. A multisport conference shall be composed of at least seven active Division I members. The member conference shall include at least seven active Division I members that sponsor both men's and women's basketball.
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