Selection Procedures/Selection Day
The WNIT committee will choose 64 teams for its Postseason WNIT. The field will consist of 31 automatic berths – one from each established conference – and 33 at-large teams. The intent of the WNIT Selection Committee is to select the 33 best available at-large teams in the nation, regardless of conference or geographical location.
The field will be announced late Monday, March 12, 2012. All information will be disseminated via the website at
http://www.womensnit.com that night, a few hours after the NCAA bracket is announced.
Selecting Teams: Automatic Berths
Thirty-one (31) spots in the Postseason WNIT will be filled automatically by the best team available in each of the nation’s 31 established conferences, after the NCAA Tournament committee makes its picks.
A team that is offered an automatic berth by the WNIT shall be the team that is a.) the highest-finishing team in its conference’s regular-season standings, and b.) is then not selected for the NCAA Tournament. It does not matter what the team’s overall record is. For the automatic qualifying berth, the WNIT believes that a team’s conference record is a more fair comparison among teams within their own conference, and that the conference record should pre-empt overall records among teams from the same conference. The automatic qualifying team is rewarded with the AQ spot for its in-conference play.
Should a conference’s automatic qualifier team decline the WNIT invitation, then the conference forfeits its AQ spot and that berth goes into the at-large pool.
In the event of a tie among teams under consideration for the WNIT automatic berth, the WNIT will abide by conference bylaws that have been set up specifically to address a tiebreaking situation in that specific conference.
In the event of a tie among teams with identical conference records and there are no specific bylaws to address it, the WNIT will recognize the conference tiebreaker, and select the team with the best seed for its conference tournament.
Multiple-division conferences receive one WNIT automatic berth. The qualifying process is the same as that for single-division conferences. However, if a conference designates more than one top seed (i.e. a No. 1 seed for each division), then the conference office shall determine, before its conference tournament begins, a seeding order for WNIT purposes.
Selecting Teams: At-large Berths
The remaining 33 team slots in the Postseason WNIT will be filled by the top teams available. Any team from a Division I conference, or a Division I independent team, will be considered. Any team considered for an at-large berth must have an overall record of .500 or better. Overall record includes conference tournament games.
The WNIT committee will utilize at least seven women’s basketball ranking systems in the selection of the at-large tournament spots, such as RPI, Massey, Dolphin, Rothman, and Sagarin. These rankings vary in their emphasis, which provides a good cross-ranking of factors such as win-loss record, strength of schedule, strength of opponents, strength of opponents’ schedule, record at home and on the road, record against Top 25 and Top 50 teams, and margin of victory, among other factors.
The WNIT will consolidate the rankings, eliminate the high and the low rankings for each team, and average the remaining rankings. This will be utilized as the principle resource for at-large selections.
The WNIT will further look at additional factors among the teams “on the bubble” such as how well a team is currently playing, common opponents, late-season win/loss runs, games against other potential invitees, and key injuries.
Factors that will not be taken into consideration at any time during team selection are host bids, location of school, attendance history, WNIT history, ability to host, etc.
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