You have to stretch back several years to find a Women’s Final Four as anticipated as this season’s edition in Dallas.
Reigning national champion South Carolina is aiming to become the fourth program ever to win back-to-back titles, Iowa’s Caitlin Clark is one of the most mesmerizing shooters the game has ever seen, LSU is looking to cap off a remarkable rebuild under the legendary Kim Mulkey and even upstart Virginia Tech is hoping to cap off their first trip to the Final Four by winning it all.
As fun as the action on the court at American Airlines Center should be this weekend, there might be even greater action to be had with some of the betting numbers you’ll find heading into the two Final Four matchups on Friday.
With that in mind, here are a few wagers to think about when it comes to this year’s Women’s NCAA Basketball Tournament:
Iowa vs. South Carolina, Under 149 points
Even if you’re not a die-hard basketball fan, chances are fair that you’ve at least heard of Clark or seen some of her ridiculous shooting highlights somewhere. Having such a crossover star emerge from the women’s basketball ranks can be rare, but it certainly sums up just how good the Hawkeyes guard has been this season that she’s entered the larger hoops discourse and a 40-point triple-double to get her team to Dallas only underscores that fact.
But the Gamecocks are a different challenge entirely, having won 42 games in a row with a combination of a deep bench and a tenacious defense that allows head coach Dawn Staley to throw a number of different looks at a player each quarter. The combination of a sub-par defensive game in the Elite Eight and the time off to game plan further should benefit what South Carolina can do in limiting Clark (and therefore Iowa) on the big stage of the Final Four.
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Even considering the handful of inevitable logo three-pointers the Naismith Player of the Year is bound to launch, this number just seems a little too high and has a bit of extra juice to the Over to take into account casual fans tuning in and betting on this particular game.
Keep in mind, the No. 1 overall seed Gamecocks have held their opponents under their scoring average in a remarkable 82 straight games, so it would not be surprising that they make it 83 on Friday to help hit the Under on the total when the final buzzer sounds.
PICK: Under 149 points scored by both teams combined
LSU -1.5 vs. Virginia Tech
March is the month when everybody gets reminded that LSU head coach Kim Mulkey turns everything up a few notches. That has been reaffirmed during this tournament run as the Tigers claw their way back into the Final Four for the first time in 15 years. They did a terrific job limiting a red-hot Miami squad to just 42 points, and they’ve got some length to clog passing lanes and guard the post that a team like the Hokies just doesn’t regularly face in ACC play.
VaTech’s Georgia Amoore has been fantastic from deep on a team that hasn’t lost in months. However, the sensational Angel Reese is looking even more unstoppable coming into this game which should make it easy for the Purple and Gold to cover.
PICK: LSU -1.5 to win by more than 1.5 points
LSU +600 to win National Championship
South Carolina is the prohibitive favorite to win it all for a reason. Aliyah Boston is destined to be the first overall pick in the WNBA, the Gamecocks have won every tournament game this season by double-digits, and they’ve got things working on both ends of the floor in looking to become an undefeated national champion with an exclamation point.
However, if there’s somebody who loves spoiling a good storyline, it just might be Mulkey and the Tigers if they were to meet them on Sunday. For starters, the veteran, title-winning coach has a player in Reese who is a savant when it comes to rebounding and seems perfectly suited to accelerate her stardom even more on the big stage offered up by the national championship game. LSU is not scared of its SEC rivals either, coming within five points late in the third quarter during their meeting earlier this season and looking perfectly capable of hanging around and causing an undefeated team to get tight late. Plus, Reese didn’t even play well in that contest in Columbia, and rematches always tend to give the underdog an extra bit of juice coming in.
There are two big challenges ahead for both in the national semifinals, but if we get the all-SEC affair most are predicting in Dallas for the right to cut down the nets, it’s certainly worth a sprinkle on LSU to be the ones to pull off the shocker of the season.
PICK: LSU +600 to win National Championship
Bryan Fischer is a college football writer for FOX Sports. He has been covering college athletics for nearly two decades at outlets such as NBC Sports, CBS Sports, Yahoo! Sports and NFL.com among others. Follow him on Twitter at @BryanDFischer.
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