Under the direction of head coach JR Payne, it has become common but certainly isn’t getting old.
On Sunday, the Colorado women’s basketball team earned a spot in the 68-team NCAA Tournament field for the fourth time in the past five years. The Buffaloes are the 10th seed in the Fort Worth 1 Region and will play seventh-seeded Illinois on Saturday (7:30 p.m. MT, ESPN2) in Nashville, at Vanderbilt University.
Host Vanderbilt, the No. 2 seed, will face 15th-seeded High Point on Saturday (5 p.m. MT, ESPNews). The winners will play on Monday (time TBD).
“We’re in!” Payne said at a watch party at Boulder Social on Sunday evening. “So excited. We had a pretty strong feeling we were in based on how we finished off the (regular) season, and I think our resume was really strong going in. We’re just really excited.”
The players and packed crowd of CU supporters at Boulder Social let out a huge cheer when the Buffs’ name was announced on ESPN’s selection show.
“Just hearing our name called, I was really shaking, my heart was beating really fast,” said senior Jade Masogayo, one of several Buffs making their first-ever appearance in the NCAA Tournament. “Just really blessed and grateful to have the opportunity to play in March.”
This will be the 17th all-time NCAA Tournament appearance for the Buffaloes (22-11), who reached the Sweet 16 in their past two trips to March Madness, in 2023 and 2024.
“This is my first time, so I’m really excited, honestly,” said junior guard Desiree Wooten, who transferred to CU last summer from North Texas. “I think itap everybody’s goal. We’re more so proud of the work we put in to actually get here. … The hard work paid off.”
CU is 4-2 all-time against Illinois but hasn’t played the Illini since Dec. 7, 2013, in Boulder.
“We’ll get started very quickly on the scout tonight,” said Payne, who was born in Tennessee. “I’m excited to go back to Tennessee, and I know our team is just really thrilled and honored to be a part of it.”
Junior guard Zyanna Walker is heading to the tournament for the fourth time and is looking forward to getting ready for the matchup with Illinois.
“I don’t really know too much about them, but I promise you by tomorrow I’ll know a whole lot,” she said.
Payne, in her 10th season at CU, snapped the program’s nine-year tournament drought in 2022, kicking off a run of three straight trips to The Dance. The Buffs nearly made it last year, too, but were the first team out of the field, landing the top spot for the WBIT instead.
This year, with a roster that includes 10 newcomers and one of the top returners — point guard Kennedy Sanders — out for the season with injury since mid-December, the Buffs proved to be one of the best teams in the Big 12.
The defensive-oriented Buffs went 11-7 in the Big 12, and then made a run to the conference semifinals last week, losing in the final seconds to now-12th ranked West Virginia, 48-47.
Along the way, CU defeated four top-25 teams and went 10-4 in its last 14 games to secure a spot in the tournament. The Buffs are No. 46 in the NET rankings and have eight Quad 1 or Quad 2 wins.
Now, they’ll try to make some noise in March Madness, but will have to do so as an underdog.
The No. 10 seed is the lowest-ever for CU in the NCAA Tournament. In fact, it will be the first time in program history that the Buffs will be the lower-seeded team for their opening game of the tournament. CU is 11-5 all-time in first-round NCAA Tournament games.
Mountain West Conference tournament champion Colorado State also made the field, as the No. 12 seed in the Sacramento 4 regional. The Rams will face No. 5 seed Michigan State on Friday. Itap the first time since 2002 that multiple women’s teams from the Centennial State will be in the NCAA Tournament.
