Sometimes, women's college basketball can seem a little chalky, you know? It's like ... yeah, UConn and South Carolina are going to be good! We know!
But that doesn't mean strange, unexpected things can't happen. Who saw LSU winning a title a few years ago? Who looked at the recruiting rankings ahead of Caitlin Clark's first year at Iowa and said, "oh, this is the next great superstar and is going to lead the Hawkeyes to multiple Final Fours?"
Here are five bold predictions that might actually happen in the 2025-26 women's college basketball season.
UConn loses its season opener to Louisville
The defending champion Huskies are popular picks to repeat despite losing Paige Bueckers to the WNBA because the returning duo of Azzi Fudd and Sarah Strong is so talented. Betting on UConn this season feels like a smart bet, but I have some slight concerns over how quickly the team adjusts to life in the post-Bueckers world.
They won't have much time to figure things out, because the Huskies face a ranked Louisville team to begin the season on Nov. 4. That Cardinals team, which is ranked No. 20 in the AP poll, received two first-place votes in the ACC preseason poll and features two players on the ACC preseason all-conference team: Tajianna Roberts and Laura Ziegler. Ziegler, a transfer from St. Joe's, is one of the nation's best rebounders as well as one of the best playmaking posts in the country, as she averaged 4.3 assists per game last season.
UConn is rightly going to be favored in this one, but never underestimate Jeff Walz and his Cardinals.
Ta'Niya Latson sees a massive drop in production
This isn't to say Ta'Niya Latson won't be good at South Carolina, but the way we understand her game likely has to change.
The leading scorer in the nation last year, Latson now lands on a very crowded South Carolina team. While I'd expect her to be the team's lead scorer this season, I have to say that I expected MiLaysia Fulwiley to be the leading scorer last year, but freshman Joyce Edwards surprisingly took that mantle.
The Gamecocks' offense is much more egalitarian than the Seminoles offense. Latson will be asked to score, but she'll also be asked to pass the ball and to operate off the ball. After averaging 25.2 points per game last season, it wouldn't shock me if she landed closer to 17 points per game this season.
Oklahoma wins a national championship
Okay, this is by far the boldest prediction, right?
Ehh. Not really. Oklahoma is a really, really good basketball team, and it wouldn't be shocking at all to see the Sooners cut down the nets when all is said and done.
Oklahoma's been building an entertaining, fast-paced system since Jennie Baranczyk took the head coaching job in 2021. She immediately won 25 games in that debut season, but her first three Sooners teams topped out as second-round exits.
But last season, Oklahoma made it to the Sweet Sixteen thanks to the addition of center Raegan Beers, who gave the team an elite interior scorer to round out the offense. Now, Oklahoma wasn't just a team that ran the floor; it was a team that could slow things down and play through a big.
This season, the Sooners added freshman Aaliyah Chavez, further expanding what this team can do by giving it a player who can theoretically be a go-to wing scorer. Obviously, we need to see if Chavez is capable of doing things at the collegiate level as well as she did in high school, but if she does translate quickly, this is a title contender.
Mikayla Blakes leads the nation in scoring
This goes along with the earlier Latson prediction. If she's not going to lead the nation in scoring, who is?
Mikayla Blakes is a great candidate. As a freshman, Blakes averaged 23.3 points per game for Vanderbilt while playing beside another 20-point-per-game scorer in Khamil Pierre. Pierre transferred to NC State though, and while the Commodores added some very good talent in the portal, that talent won't replace Pierre's scoring, which means Blakes will have an increased workload this season.
For real, I think we're going to see some wild scoring numbers out of Blakes this year. I'm talking, like, the only non-Caitlin Clark player to average 30 points per game since Kelsey Plum. Blakes is going to be a household name soon.
Richmond makes the Sweet Sixteen
No mid-major program made it to the Sweet Sixteen last year. That won't be the case this time around, though, because the Richmond Spiders exist. Last season, the Spiders made the tournament as a No. 8 seed and defeated Georgia Tech in the first round, but ran into UCLA in the second round, ending the team's tournament run.
Here's the thing, though, about being a mid-major in women's college basketball: You have to earn the respect of the tournament committee over multiple seasons to really get seeded where you should be. Richmond's 74-49 first-round win over Georgia Tech is good evidence that the Spiders were underseeded. This year, another strong performance could get them into the range of being a six-seed, which would make a Sweet 16 path much, much easier.
So, why this confidence in Richmond? Because the Spiders have Maggie Doogan, one of — if not the — most underrated players in the nation. Doogan ranked in the 94th percentile or better last season in points per game, field goal percentage — overall as well as 2-point and 3-point —, rebounds per game, assists per game and blocks per game.