The Athletic has live coverage of Iowa vs. South Carolina in the women’s national championship game.

College coaches are the reason so many high school athletes choose a school in the first place. Whether the coach is successful, runs a specific style, develops athletes, creates a strong culture, the person in charge has an influence. With the transfer portal, more players eye coaches throughout their careers.

So The Athletic was curious: If players could choose any coach — other than their own — who would it be? On the flip side, which coach would they not want to play for?

We asked 95 NCAA Tournament players, including 85 in the Sweet 16, questions about their sport. They were granted anonymity to be as candid as possible without fear of repercussions. Some players abstained from answering certain questions. They provided their opinions on a wide range of topics, including the player they’d want to invite on their team and which of their peers are the biggest trash-talkers. We’ll run the rest of the series this week leading up to the Final Four.

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For the second straight season, players chose Dawn Staley as the coach — other than their own — who they would most like to play for. Like last year she won the poll by 41 votes, and it was a landslide again.

The top two…

On Monday, Tennessee announced that it was moving on from Kellie Harper, who went 108-52 in five seasons with the Lady Vols.

The move is a strong indicator that Tennessee understands the arms race happening in women’s basketball and doesn’t want to be left behind. With South Carolina at the top of the conference, and LSU — the reigning national champs — right there, too, there hasn’t been a ton of space at the very top of the league. However, moving on from Harper — who in four of five seasons finished third in the SEC — is a pretty strong statement that anything other than contending for the top spot isn’t good enough. And, with Texas and Oklahoma joining the SEC next season, the league’s women’s basketball power only becomes stronger and deeper.

The big question here: Does Tennessee stick with another Pat Summitt-linked coach? Or after Holly Warlick (the Lady Vols’ head coach from 2012-19 who was a longtime Summitt assistant) and Harper (who won three national titles are a player for Summitt), is Tennessee going to step outside of the Summitt line?

The Lady Vols are legendary program that have helped lay the foundation of women’s basketball. They haven’t won a national title since 2008, but with the right coaching staff in place, this is a program…

In 2010, Satyan Devadoss, then at Williams College, now a professor of applied mathematics and computer science at the University of San Diego, wrote: “It can truly be called the Michael Jordan of chalk, the Rolls Royce of chalk.”

He was talking about Hagoromo Fulltouch, a brand of blackboard chalk that was so smooth to the touch, moisture-proof and dust-free that math teachers around the world went gaga for it until the company that made it went out of business in 2015.

Or maybe Professor Devadoss was peering into the future to describe the 2024 NCAA women’s tournament.

Higher seeds went a perfect 16 for 16 in Saturday’s first-round matchups. In the dozen games we analyzed as Bracket Breakers matchups, where teams were separated by at least five seeds, favorites won all 12 and by an average of more than 20 points. Our model saw Syracuse as a very vulnerable giant, but Arizona shot just 5-19 (26.3 percent) on threes and committed 21 turnovers. And when the great Dyaisha Fair returned after being carried off the court with an injury at the end of the third quarter, the Orange crushed the Wildcats. Fair scored her team’s final 13 points, leading Syracuse to a 5-point comeback win. Slingshot also admired Florida Gulf Coast (as always), and the Eagles led Oklahoma for most…

As college basketball players head to NCAA Tournament arenas on their team buses, many will slip on headphones, zone out to a song and absorb the vibes. Coaches also sometimes take a small moment from poring over last-minute scouting reports to escape to a melody filtering through their airpods.

These soundtracks, perhaps subconsciously, serve an objective, too. Music can settle our nerves — or pump us up. A specific banger can provide a dose of confidence. A sentimental song might remind us of our grand purpose. “Music is the shorthand of emotion,” Leo Tolstoy once wrote.

So as March Madness gets underway, The Athletic wondered what these tournament-bound stars will be listening to before they compete in some of the most important games in their lives. We asked women’s and men’s tournament players and coaches to share their pre-game playlists. Players’ tastes ranged from Nicki Minaj to Veeze to even Elvis Presley. Coaches ranged from Gospel to AC/DC.

You won’t achieve the same jump shot as these athletes by listening to their hype music, but these playlists will get you ready (from your couch) for tip-off.

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Women’s NCAA Tournament players’ mixtapes

JuJu Watkins

Guard | No. 1 USC

The brightest freshman in women’s basketball, Watkins has taken the Trojans to new…

Selection Sunday has come and gone, and if your favorite team landed in the Albany 2 Region, my sincerest apologies.

At The Athletic, we have you covered with all the big-picture details of the bracket, including the paths to the Final Four for last year’s national finalists as well as South Carolina, who enters as this year’s favorite. But the fun of filling out a bracket (you can print ours here) isn’t just figuring out the Final Four teams; it’s knowing which 11th-seeded team will upset a power conference program and which underdog can silence a hosting team’s home crowd.

You can’t have the Big Dance without Cinderella, and thankfully, there are several candidates in this year’s field waiting to try on that glass slipper to see if it fits. Here’s a look at some double-digit seeds who are threats to spring early-round upsets.

No. 11 Texas A&M

I just can’t quit Texas A&M. The Aggies featured in my preseason top 25 — a prediction that did not age well as they lost five of their final six SEC games and failed to enter the rankings for the entirety of the regular season. However, when Texas A&M is at its peak, it can contend with talented opposition. The Aggies boast double-digit wins over Kansas, Ole Miss and Tennessee, and they stayed within 11 points of South…

Conference tournament week is essentially a welcomed opening act to March Madness. It’s college basketball’s groundhog on Feb. 2, forecasting what kind of NCAA Tournament we might be in for.

The collective storylines and potential battles we’ll see in the conference tournaments this season are full of promise. The end of the Pac-12. The Caitlin Clark Show. South Carolina’s superhero mode. No. 1 seeds up for grabs and tournament bidding on the line. Surely, we’ll be treated to a few surprises along the way too.

Selection Sunday looms on March 17, but until then, let the conference games begin. We’ve got you covered about who to watch, how to watch and what to know.

Power conference tournaments

ACC

Dates: March 6-10

TV: ESPN, ACCN

Location: Greensboro, N.C.

Top seed: Virginia Tech (23-6, 14-4)

The skinny: Hokies center Elizabeth Kitley’s knee will be a focal point of the tournament. Whether she plays could determine Virginia Tech’s feasibility to reach the Final Four again. The Hokies are in position to gain a No. 2 seed for the NCAA Tournament as long as they don’t stumble in Greensboro.

North Carolina State’s curious losses to Duke and North Carolina could be history if the Wolfpack peak in conference play and return to form. They’re working to hold on to a No. 3…