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The 2025 Division I women’s basketball tournament will finally receive a version of the “units” system that the men’s tournament has enjoyed for years.
The NCAA Division I membership voted unanimously Wednesday to implement a multimillion-dollar prize money pool for March Madness, effective immediately. The vote is a result of four years of pressure from administrators and coaches in women’s basketball demanding a prize money system for their marquee event.
“This is a historic day for women’s sports, women’s basketball and the NCAA,” NCAA president Charlie Baker said in a statement. “We have made investing in women’s sports a priority, and today’s vote means our members have the opportunity to do even more on campus to promote and support female athletes. I can’t wait to see all the incredible things they do.”
The pot will begin at $15 million for the 2025 tournament, grow to $20 million in 2026, and $25 million in 2027. That means each unit will be worth $113,636 this upcoming year. The distribution structure will be “similar to” the men’s system, with both set payments to conferences and increasing payments to teams as they advance. The value of the prize pool will increase 2.9% each year, as is standard across the NCAA. Though the total amount of money is significantly lower than the men’s unit system ($226 million in 2024), it is roughly the same percentage of its media deal’s annual value ($870 million per year).
The units issue was thrust into the spotlight after major disparities were exposed between the 2021 men’s and women’s tournaments. A subsequent gender equity report authored by the law firm Kaplan Hecker and Fink found the lack of units for the women’s basketball tournament was one of the biggest equity issues the NCAA could rectify. The men’s units system incentivized athletic departments nationwide to invest in their men’s basketball programs, and the hope was that a women’s prize money pool would force schools to do the same for the women’s teams.
In the wake of the Kaplan report, some of the nation’s most accomplished women’s coaches, as well as the Women’s Basketball Coaches Association itself, became increasingly vocal about the need for a units system. South Carolina coach Dawn Staley has said on multiple occasions it’s the most important change the NCAA could make.
But despite the pressure, the NCAA was unwilling to implement a units system without a fresh television contract. The governing body had been locked into a long-term deal with ESPN for dozens of sports, including women’s basketball, that averaged only about $55 million per year. (The Kaplan report estimated the women’s tournament was worth more than $100 million on its own.)
In January 2024, the governing body signed a 10-year, $920 million deal with ESPN for 40 sports including women’s basketball. The deal values the women’s tournament at $65 million per year, or twice its previous price, as Front Office Sports reported at the time. The NCAA finally released a unit proposal in August 2024, six months before the NCAA Convention vote.
