The era of the Spider continues: Women’s basketball back in March Madness

University of Richmond women’s basketball senior guard Katie Hill said it best following the Spiders’ one-point loss to Saint Joseph’s University in the Atlantic 10 tournament semifinals on March 8 – that the sooner than expected exit from the tournament would not define their season.

There was still postseason basketball left to be played, Hill noted in the postgame press conference. 

And she was right. 

For the second-straight season and the fifth time in program history, the Spiders will head to the NCAA Tournament – a perfect consolation prize for not winning their conference tournament. The accomplishment was made official during the Selection Show on March 16. 

UR will compete in Regional 1 as a No. 8 seed and will take on the No. 9 Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets in Los Angeles, Calif. on March 21. 

“I mean obviously this is such a big moment, right?” UR Head Coach Aaron Roussell said in a press conference, reacting to the postseason news. “You live for this as a kid, you know the players live for this and this is truly a lifetime moment.” 

Given the bracket projections leading up to the field selections, and the resume UR had put forth during the 2024-25 campaign, especially during its non-conference schedule, it was likely the Spiders’ name would be called. 

“Honestly, I’ve tried to not look at any bracketology or anything, just because last year, there was a guarantee that we were in and this year I didn’t want to be too disappointed if we didn’t get in,” junior forward Maggie Doogan said in a press conference. “So I haven’t really looked at anything, but I mean, just sitting around my best friends there, and they were all super excited, so obviously that amped me up. And then seeing our name at an eight-seed. Getting to wear white, in L.A., is gonna be just an unbelievable experience.” 

The Spiders have won 26 games in the regular season for consecutive seasons. Unfortunately, UR was not able to win a second-straight A-10 championship, but its at-large bid into March Madness marks the second time in the team’s history that the Spiders have notched trips to the Big Dance in back-to-back years – the last time was in 1990 and 1991, respectively. 

UR has never played Georgia Tech – a team that will enter the NCAA Tournament coming off a quarterfinals loss to North Carolina State University on March 7 in the Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament. 

While the Yellow Jackets do compete in a conference that frequently sends schools to March Madness, the Spiders will enter gameplay with ample preparation, as they got their fair share of power-conference competition in the first half of their season. 

UR defeated a Big 12 Conference opponent in Oklahoma State University and took on three Southeastern Conference opponents in the University of Texas, the University of Tennessee and the University of Alabama – four schools that are all in the NCAA Tournament field as well. 

In addition to those four schools, the Spiders also defeated Fairfield University, Columbia University and fellow A-10 member, George Mason University – three more programs in the 2025 tournament field. This means, during its schedule this season, UR matched up against seven teams who will now compete in March Madness. 

“Last year when we went through this it was, ‘go get top-50 games, go get top-50 games, go play a schedule,’” Roussell said. “And made a commitment with our administration – sometimes my staff looked at me like I was crazy. I think the players were on board, but maybe some ‘what the heck is going on?’ And I just wanted to make sure that we got to the end of the season, and if we needed an at-large bid, I didn’t want a weak schedule to be the reason that we didn’t get in.” 

The Spiders heading back to the Big Dance is just the most recent accomplishment in an already stellar season. 

Before even lacing up for the A-10 Tournament, UR had already won the regular season conference championship for a second-straight year, Roussell had won his second-straight A-10 Coach of the Year award and Doogan had won A-10 Player of the Year. 

Doogan and junior guard Rachel Ullstrom also garnered All-Conference First Team honors, while graduate forward Addie Budnik was placed on the All-Conference Second Team, only putting an exclamation point on the Spiders’ monumental season up to that point.  

Now UR will get another chance to play on college basketball’s most renowned stage, this time around trying to get past the Round of 64 – a feat the program was unable to accomplish in its four previous appearances. 

Contact contributor Jimmy James at jimmy.james@richmond.edu.