Miami, Ohio State and LSU continue to erase the chalk in the women’s 2023 NCAA tournament. Only the Greenville 1 Regional has provided a 1-2 matchup as undefeated and top-seeded South Carolina will face Maryland in the Elite Eight.
The Big Ten delivered on its preseason promise of a league loaded with heavyweights, putting three teams — Iowa joins the Buckeyes and Terps — in the Elite Eight. The ACC also has three, but Miami, which finished tied for sixth in the conference and had the lowest NET ranking (50th) of any of the league’s eight teams in the field of 68, wasn’t supposed to be one of them. ESPN Analytics said the Hurricanes had a 3% chance of reaching the Elite Eight before March Madness tipped off. They are this year’s party crashers in a tournament that is getting increasingly more wide-open — see: 10th-seeded Creighton in 2022 and 6-seed Texas in 2021 — despite the presence of heavy favorite South Carolina this year.
Miami is the first No. 9 seed to make it this far since Arkansas in 1998. The seed total of 12 in its game with No. 3 seed LSU on Sunday (7 p.m. ET, ESPN) is the highest number a regional final has ever seen, making it officially the most…
