Greatest Women’s College Basketball Players Bracket Challenge (1997 to 2020)

Welcome to the Greatest Women’s College Basketball Players Bracket Challenge presented by http://www.wbasketballblog.com! We have assembled the greatest women’s college basketball players starting from the year 1997 to 2020.

In order to be named as a player in this bracket challenge, there had to be a few criteria. First of all, all of the women’s college players listed played as a freshmen in 1997 or later. No players that played earlier than that were included, because there are so many great women’s college basketball players and there had to be a specific time frame. Second of all, no active players were included because they are still playing and making their college careers.

We assembled a selection committee made up of women’s basketball media, coaches, fans to come up with a top 64 of women’s college basketball players who fit the above criteria. To learn more about the selection committee, you can scroll down after the bracket to learn more about each member.

In our top 64, four players were named the #1 overall seeds. Breanna Stewart of Connecticut, Diana Taurasi of Connecticut, Maya Moore of Connecticut and Candace Parker of Tennessee. Breanna Stewart was named the #1 overall seed because she was named as the top player in most of the selection committee’s lists.

Voting will commence a few days from now and votes will be determined by the Twitter Polls we send out. The winner will be selected sometime in April.

The bracket can be viewed below. We hope you enjoy this challenge and make sure to let everyone know about it!

Women’s College Basketball Players Bracket Challenge (1997 to 2020)

Selection Committee

Mel Greenberg – Twitter

Mel Greenberg has written for the Philadelphia Inquirer since 1970 where he covered college and professional women’s basketball. He helped pioneer national coverage of the sport and organized the first Top 25 women’s college basketball poll. He has been called “The Guru” of women’s basketball. In 1991, Greenberg received the first media award from the Women’s Basketball Coaches Association, an award that has since been named after him. The annual Mel Greenberg Media Award is given to “a member of the media who has best displayed a commitment to women’s basketball and to advancing the role of the media in promoting the women’s game”. In 2007, Greenberg was inducted into the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame.

Katie Moore – Twitter

Katie Moore is a 37 year old stay at home parent of three living outside of Philadelphia, but she grew up in Virginia and Texas. She’s been a women’s basketball fan since the 1993-1994 season in which she started playing basketball herself. She loves all sports, but basketball is her passion. She wished she could’ve played in college, but being vertically challenged (5’3″) and not that athletic, she was forced to stick to watching and cheering. She graduated from Notre Dame.

Glenn Starkey – Twitter

Glenn Starkey has been following women’s college basketball since 2001 and has followed teams from the New York metro area. He started following the Rutgers women’s basketball team in 2001 to 2010 which quickly became into a fan of all of women’s college basketball. He moved to support the St.John’s women’s basketball team after 2010 as he lives a mile within an arena. He has developed relationships with various coaches of women’s college basketball and has supported several schools for the past 11 years. He works in insurance and supports the New York Liberty WNBA team and the Sky Blue soccer team in the summer.

Mary Carol Bond – Twitter

Mary Carol Bond (Mac to her friends, she/her) is a lifelong women’s basketball fan, whose father loved March Madness and began to include women’s teams in the family tournament as soon as his daughters began to play the sport in the 80’s.  Raised in Chicago on Notre Dame and DePaul, Mary Carol has lived for years on the Great Plains, and is now a Husker women’s basketball season ticket holder who is relied on to have the game scout for her entire section of Pinnacle Bank Arena, a frequent traveler to WNBA and NCAAW games all over the mid-west and when travel is safe again has promised herself that she will see a Final Four in person. 

Craig Morancie – Twitter

Craig Morancie has been a basketball fan since the 1980’s. He has done radio broadcasts for his college team (Georgetown) from 1984-1987 as well as Brooklyn College from 1993 to 1994.

Jaison King – Twitter

Jaison coaches high school, club and AAU basketball. He coaches on the girls side. He is currently coaching the North Toronto Huskies basketball club, Havergal College and the Stanford University girls elite camp. In the summer, he also coaches with Ontario Basketball as part of the Ontario Summer Development Program and the Ontario Summer Games. He is also the head coach of the U14 girls team for the Toronto region. In 2020, he was awarded the Excellence in Coaching award from the Ontario Coaches Association in part for his work with women’s basketball.

Porter Hayes – Twitter

Porter Hayes covers women’s sports at the University of Arkansas. He has been following women’s basketball for over 25 years. It started when his father was stationed in Connecticut for the Army. He started to watch the UCONN women’s basketball and fell in love with the game. He is married to a wonderful wife, Amber, for 5 years and has three boys, Danny (15), Elijah(11) and Gavin (11).

Mike DeKalb – Twitter

Based in Los Angeles, Mike DeKalb is a lifelong sports fan who recently started his own women’s basketball blog called “Goose on Hoops”.

Colleen Couture – Twitter

Current college student and women’s basketball fanatic, Colleen Couture began her love for professional basketball just a few years ago. She and her sister traveled from Vermont (her home state) to Tennessee to see the Lady Volunteers take down Ole Miss. Fast forward a few years, she has now been a sports writer since 2020 and typically covers the Tennessee Lady Volunteers but is also an avid fan of the WNBA. She writes for Global Women’s Sports Radio and is a free lance digital sports illustrator, @she.drawssports. When she finds free time away from college homework you can find her catching up on the latest stats from the game and reading biographies of women in sports. 

Alexandria Miller – Twitter

Alexandria Miller lives in Westland, Michigan. Basketball was her first love. She plays junior college basketball. Women’s college basketball is seeing raw talent and that is why she enjoys watching every part of it.

Michael McManus – Twitter

Michael McManus is currently based out of Salt Lake City, Utah, originally from Bennettsville, South Carolina. He fell in love with women’s college basketball, when he watched Candace Parker defeat Candice Wiggins in the 2008 National Championship game. As time went on, he learnt more and more about the history of the sport and his fondness became a passion. You can usually find him watching any and every college game he can find on 4 devices at home.