March Madness 2025: Key Teams, Players, and Upset Predictions

The NCAA men’s and women’s basketball tournaments kick off with top seeds, Cinderella stories, and title contenders in focus.

The 2025 NCAA men's and women's basketball tournaments feature 68 teams each, with the men's championship on April 7 in San Antonio and the women's final on April 6 in Tampa.
Top seeds for the women's bracket include South Carolina, UCLA, USC, and Texas, while the men's bracket features Auburn, Florida, Duke, and Houston among the top-ranked teams.
Potential Cinderella stories include Drake and Akron in the men's tournament, while in the women's bracket, Florida Gulf Coast and Harvard are seen as potential bracket-busters.
Key players to watch include Cooper Flagg (Duke), Johni Broome (Auburn), JuJu Watkins (USC), and Paige Bueckers (UConn), all of whom are expected to make significant impacts for their teams.
The SEC dominates the men's tournament with a record 14 teams, while the women's tournament is noted for its competitive parity, with multiple teams seen as legitimate title contenders.