Burning women's college basketball questions for home stretch of 2025-26 season

Life comes at you fast. It seems like just yesterday conference play was beginning, and now here we are, less than three weeks from the end of the women's college basketball regular season.

We know one thing for certain: UConn is extremely likely to go undefeated in the regular season, win the Big East tournament with ease and be the No. 1 overall seed in the NCAA tournament. But beyond that? Well, there is still a lot to figure out.

As we head into the final stretch, the CBS Sports women's basketball team pinpointed our biggest questions in each of the top four conferences.

SEC: Who will come out on top?

Even though South Carolina is currently at the top of the standings, there really is no clear answer at the moment. The SEC has been extremely competitive with multiple upsets throughout conference play – including South Carolina falling to Oklahoma in overtime on Jan. 22. No team is undefeated in conference play and there are still some big matchups remaining on the schedule. 

Right now, No. 3 South Carolina is at the top of the standings with a 10-1 record in conference play. But No. 5 Vanderbilt is just one game back, No. 4 Texas is a mere 1.5 games back and both No. 6 LSU and No. 22 Tennessee are two games back.

Texas lost to LSU in their first meeting, but the Longhorns got revenge last week. The teams each won in their own home arena, which has been an important advantage for many teams. Texas needs to win out in the regular season and hope that South Carolina stumbles suffers another loss if it wants the regular-season crown. If Vanderbilt or LSU still have hopes of playing spoiler, both squads need to win out as well.

On Monday night, Vanderbilt and Texas both had good wins over No. 10 Oklahoma and No. 18 Kentucky, respectively. But this is a massive week for the top teams and will go a long way towards deciding who ends up as the No. 1 seed in the conference tournament. LSU hosts South Carolina on Saturday and Vanderbilt hosts Texas on Thursday. As Vic Schaefer put it in October, this conference is "pure hell."

No team can let its foot off the gas right now, which Tennessee coach Kim Caldwell highlighted after the 43-point loss to South Carolina by saying her team has had a quitting attitude in big games. The Lady Vols, who are currently in a bit of a free fall, still have plenty of opportunities to turn things around as they have five ranked opponents remaining in the regular season. Sounds brutal, but that is just the SEC. -- Isabel Gonzalez

Big 12: What's going on with TCU?

The new-look Horned Frogs, who brought in nine new players this season, got off to a 14-0 start, but are just 7-4 since then. After being ranked as high as No. 8 in the country, they've fallen to No. 17 in Monday's most recent AP Top 25 poll, and now have their work cut out for them to earn a top-16 seed and host games in the NCAA Tournament next month. Their close to the Big 12 regular season will give them a chance to earn that spot, or fall even further in the rankings. They still have to play Baylor twice, West Virginia and Iowa State. 

To be fair to TCU, it's not as if they've been a disaster in recent weeks. One of their losses was in overtime, while the other three have been by two points or fewer, including Sunday's heartbreaking defeat to Colorado on a last-second and-one by Jade Masogayo. If a few plays go their way in those contests, they could be 25-0. Still, it's clear that their early-season dominance against a soft non-conference schedule was something of a mirage. 

Olivia Miles has been as advertised, but she can only do so much. The Horned Frogs' offense has fallen off a cliff since conference play began. Here's a look at their numbers during non-conference play compared to the last 11 games (which includes a loss to Ohio State in the Coretta Scott King Classic):

If the Horned Frogs can't reverse some of those numbers -- particularly their 3-point shooting and turnover rate -- it's going to be hard for them to make another deep run in the NCAA Tournament. --Jack Maloney

Big Ten: Who will get the double byes in the conference tournament?

Once again, UCLA leads the Big Ten. Although the team suffered an early-season loss to Texas that seemingly took the luster off last year's Final Four appearance, Cori Close has her team on a 17-game winning streak. The Bruins are undefeated in Big 10 play and set to be a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament, per the latest CBS Sports Women's Bracketology. 

After holding on to beat Michigan 69-66 on Sunday, UCLA looks firmly in control of the conference. But that doesn't mean there isn't still intrigue for the remainder of the regular season. Four teams get double byes in the Big Ten conference tournament, meaning they get a pass right to the quarterfinals. And the fight to join UCLA in the quarterfinals is going to be pretty epic.

Right now, Michigan is the second-highest ranked Big Ten team in the AP top 25 at No. 7 and has taken the top two teams in the country -- UConn and UCLA -- down to the wire.  Michigan leads the conference in points per game and offensive rebounds and averages 26 points off opponent turnovers. 

But while Michigan is currently second in the Big Ten, the Wolverines are not there alone -- they're actually tied with No. 8 Ohio State. Notably, No. 15 Iowa, No. 13 Michigan State and the surging Minnesota Gophers are all within two games of Michigan and Ohio State in the standings and Washington, Maryland and USC are all within two and a half games of Iowa in fourth. The good news is that a lot of these teams are playing one another down the stretch; Michigan alone ends its season playing Michigan State, Iowa, Ohio State and Maryland. It's going to be a photo finish. -- Erica Ayala

ACC: Can the North Carolina Tar Heels play spoiler?

A couple of weeks ago, I singled out the ACC conference as one of the biggest disappointments of the season. And while I stand by that, the league has shown signs of life over the past couple of weeks. Duke, in particular, is surging. The Blue Devils are currently on a 15-game win streak and they really turned heads when they took down then-No. 6 Louisville on the road last week.

Duke and Louisville are firmly at the top of the conference right now, and look close to being locks for getting a top-four seed in the NCAA tournament and getting to host in the first and second rounds. But nothing is a given this time of year, and there's one team that has a chance to really shake things up down the stretch: North Carolina. After back-to-back losses to Stanford and Notre Dame in January that knocked them out of the top 25, the Tar Heels are on a seven-game win streak that includes a key victory over rivals NC State last Monday. This week they are back up to No. 21 in the rankings. 

But the main reason why I'm eying Courtney Banghart's squad? They play Duke twice down the stretch, starting this Sunday in Durham. To be a real spoiler, you have to have the opportunity to take down the best in the regular season, and the Tar Heels have a chance to do that twice. North Carolina would need a lot of help in order to win the ACC regular season, but the team could do the second-best thing and keep its biggest rival, Duke, from taking the crown. Considering the Tar Heels are up to No. 19 in the NET rankings and therefore have an outside shot at getting a coveted top-four seed in the NCAA tournament, they have plenty of motivation to do just that. -- Lindsay Gibbs