2017–18 Southeastern Conference women's basketball season

2017–18 SEC Women's Basketball Season
League	NCAA Division I
Sport	Basketball
Number of teams	14
WNBA Draft
Top draft pick	A'ja Wilson (South Carolina)
Picked by	Las Vegas Aces, 1st overall
Regular season
2018 SEC Champions	Mississippi State
Tournament
Champions	South Carolina
Runners-up	Mississippi State

2017–18 SEC women's basketball standings

	Conf							Overall
Team	W		L		PCT			W		L		PCT
No. 4 Mississippi State	16	–	0		1.000			37	–	2		.949
No. 7 South Carolina †	12	–	4		.750			29	–	7		.806
No. 18 Georgia	12	–	4		.750			26	–	7		.788
No. 12 Tennessee	11	–	5		.688			25	–	8		.758
No. 17 Missouri	11	–	5		.688			24	–	8		.750
No. 14 Texas A&M	11	–	5		.688			26	–	10		.722
No. 24 LSU	11	–	5		.688			19	–	10		.655
Alabama	7	–	9		.438			20	–	14		.588
Kentucky	6	–	10		.375			15	–	17		.469
Auburn	5	–	11		.313			14	–	15		.483
Arkansas	3	–	13		.188			13	–	18		.419
Florida	3	–	13		.188			11	–	19		.367
Vanderbilt	3	–	13		.188			7	–	24		.226
Ole Miss	1	–	15		.063			12	–	19		.387
† 2018 SEC tournament winner As of April 1, 2018 Rankings from AP poll

The 2017–18 Southeastern Conference women's basketball season began with practices in October 2017, followed by the start of the 2017–18 NCAA Division I women's basketball season in November. Conference play started in late December 2017 and concluded in February 2018, followed by the 2018 SEC women's basketball tournament at the Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, Tennessee.

Pre-season

Pre-season team predictions

	Media	Coaches
1.	South Carolina
2.	Mississippi State
3.	Missouri
4.	Tennessee	Texas A&M
5.	Texas A&M	Tennessee
6.	Kentucky
7.	LSU
8.	Georgia
9.	Alabama
10.	Auburn	Vanderbilt
11.	Vanderbilt	Auburn
12.	Florida	Ole Miss
13.	Ole Miss	Florida
14.	Arkansas

Pre-season All-SEC teams

Media	Coaches
A'ja Wilson South Carolina	Wilson
Victoria Vivians Mississippi State	Vivians
Morgan William Mississippi State	William
Sophie Cunningham Missouri	Cunningham
Mercedes Russell Tennessee	Russell
	Raigyne Louis LSU
	Jaime Nared Tennessee
	Khaalia Hillsman Texas A&M

• Coaches select eight players
• Players in bold are choices for SEC Player of the Year

Head coaches

Note: Stats shown are before the beginning of the season. Overall and SEC records are from time at current school.

Team	Head coach	Previous job	Seasons at school	Overall record	SEC record	NCAA tournaments	NCAA Final Fours	NCAA championships
Alabama	Kristy Curry	Texas Tech	5th	373–214	64–65	9	1	0
Arkansas	Mike Neighbors	Washington	1st	98–41	–	3	1	0
Auburn	Terri Williams-Flournoy	Georgetown	6th	231–180	30–52	4	0	0
Florida	Cameron Newbauer	Belmont	1st	79–50	–	2	0	0
Georgia	Joni Taylor	Georgia (ass't)	3rd	37–25	16–16	1	0	0
Kentucky	Matthew Mitchell	Memphis	11th	271–129	102–54	8	0	0
LSU	Nikki Fargas	UCLA	7th	185–109	48–46	7	0	0
Mississippi State	Vic Schaefer	Sam Houston State	6th	204–161	45–35	3	1	0
Missouri	Robin Pingeton	Illinois State	8th	458–257	36–40	4	0	0
Ole Miss	Matt Insell	Kentucky	5th	58–68	17–43	0	0	0
South Carolina	Dawn Staley	Temple	10th	393–160	97–45	12	2	1
Tennessee	Holly Warlick	Tennessee (ass't)	6th	128–46	60–20	5	0	0
Texas A&M	Gary Blair	Arkansas	15th	739–304	51–27	23	2	1
Vanderbilt	Stephanie White	Indiana	2nd	14–16	4–12	0	0	0

Weekly rankings

Main article: 2017–18 NCAA Division I women's basketball rankings

Legend: ██ Increase in ranking. ██ Decrease in ranking. RV=Received votes. NR=No rank/vote.

		Pre	Wk 2	Wk 3	Wk 4	Wk 5	Wk 6	Wk 7	Wk 8	Wk 9	Wk 10	Wk 11	Wk 12	Wk 13	Wk 14	Wk 15	Wk 16	Wk 17	Wk 18	Final
Alabama	AP	NR	RV	RV	NR
	C	NR
Arkansas	AP	NR
	C	NR
Auburn	AP	NR
	C	NR
Florida	AP	NR
	C	NR
Georgia	AP	NR	NR	RV	RV	NR	NR	NR	NR	NR	RV	RV	21	17	18	20	19	19
	C	RV	RV	NR	NR	NR	NR	RV	NR	RV	24	20	18	18	19	19	18
Kentucky	AP	RV	25	22	22	20	RV	NR
	C	RV	RV	22	23	RV	NR
LSU	AP	RV	NR	NR	NR	NR	NR	NR	NR	NR	RV	NR	NR	RV	RV	RV	24	24
	C	RV	NR	NR	NR	NR	NR	NR	NR	NR	NR	NR	NR	NR	RV	RV	RV
Mississippi State	AP	7	7	6	6	6	5	5	5	5	4	3	2	2	2	2	2	2
	C	4	3	3	3	3	3	3	3	3	3	2	2	2	2	2	2
Missouri	AP	16	23	23	19	17	16	16	16	15	12	11	11	15	15	13	11	14
	C	16	19	18	17	16	16	16	16	13	12	11	15	15	13	9	13
Ole Miss	AP	NR
	C	NR
South Carolina	AP	4	4	3	5	5	4	4	4	4	9	10	9	7	7	8	7	8
	Coaches	2	2	6	6	5	5	5	5	8	10	7	6	8	8	6	8
Tennessee	AP	14	13	12	12	11	7	7	7	7	6	6	10	12	11	11	15	12
	Coaches	18	14	13	13	7	7	7	7	6	7	10	13	11	11	14	12
Texas A&M	AP	20	19	19	18	21	19	19	22	19	17	16	15	14	14	17	17	15
	C	RV	25	21	22	22	20	21	19	16	17	15	12	14	18	18	16
Vanderbilt	AP	NR
	C	NR

Source:

Regular season matrix

This table summarizes the head-to-head results between teams in conference play.

	Alabama	Arkansas	Auburn	Florida	Georgia	Kentucky	LSU	Mississippi State	Missouri	Ole Miss	South Carolina	Tennessee	Texas A&M	Vanderbilt
vs. Alabama	–	1–1	1–0	0–1	0–0	1–0	0–1	1–0	1–0	0–0	1–0	0–0	1–0	0–1
vs. Arkansas	1–1	–	0–1	1–0	1–0	1–0	0–0	1–0	1–0	0–1	1–0	1–0	0–0	1–0
vs. Auburn	0–1	1–0	–	0–1	1–0	1–0	1–1	0–0	0–0	0–0	1–0	2–0	2–0	0–0
vs. Florida	1–0	0–1	1–0	–	1–0	1–0	1–0	2–0	1–0	1–1	0–0	0–0	0–0	0–0
vs. Georgia	0–0	0–1	0–1	0–1	–	0–1	1–0	1–0	0–1	0–1	0–0	0–0	0–1	0–2
vs. Kentucky	0–1	0–1	0–1	0–1	1–0	–	1–0	0–0	1–0	0–0	1–0	1–0	1–0	1–0
vs. LSU	1–0	0–1	1–1	0–1	0–1	0–1	–	1–0	0–1	0–0	0–0	0–1	1–0	0–1
vs. Mississippi State	0–1	0–1	0–0	0–2	0–1	0–0	0–1	–	0–1	0–2	0–1	0–0	0–0	0–0
vs. Missouri	0–1	0–0	0–0	0–1	1–0	0–1	1–0	1–0	–	0–1	1–1	0–1	0–0	0–1
vs. Ole Miss	0–0	1–0	0–0	1–1	1–0	0–0	0–0	2–0	1–0	–	1–0	1–0	1–0	1–0
vs. South Carolina	0–1	0–1	0–1	0–1	0–1	0–2	0–0	1–0	1–1	0–1	–	2–0	0–1	0–1
vs. Tennessee	1–0	0–1	0–1	0–1	0–1	0–1	1–0	1–0	1–0	0–1	0–2	–	1–1	0–2
vs. Texas A&M	0–1	0–1	0–2	0–1	1–0	0–1	1–1	1–1	0–0	0–1	1–0	1–1	–	0–1
vs. Vanderbilt	1–0	0–1	1–0	1–0	2–0	0–1	1–0	1–0	1–0	0–1	1–0	2–0	1–0	–
Total	7–9	3–13	5–11	3–13	12–4	6–10	11–5	16–0	11–5	1–15	12–4	11–5	11–5	3–13

Attendance

Team	Arena	Capacity	Game 1	Game 2	Game 3	Game 4	Game 5	Game 6	Game 7	Game 8	Total	Average	% of capacity
			Game 9	Game 10	Game 11	Game 12	Game 13	Game 14	Game 15	Game 16
Alabama	Coleman Coliseum	15,383	2,414	2,035	4,179	2,009	2,229	1,971	2,070	2,410	27,770	2,314	15%
			1,370	2,323	2,117	2,643
Arkansas	Bud Walton Arena	19,368	4,719	1,739	1,132	1,139	1,821	1,481	1,388	1,701	17,721	1,172	6%
			1,288	1,313
Auburn	Auburn Arena	9,121	1,489	1,879	2,769	2,589	1,585	1,749	1,788	1,980	21,295	2,130	23%
			2,110	3,357
Florida	O'Connell Center	10,133	1,509	1,143	2,989	1,009	1,512	1,008	1,054	1,008	20,886	1,492	15%
			1,206	1,305	1,509	1,332	2,601	1,701
Georgia	Stegeman Coliseum	10,523	3,292	2,194	2,115	2,084	3,390	4,290	6,942	2,137	41,901	3,223	31%
			2,614	2,934	2,229	5,012	2,668
Kentucky	Memorial Coliseum	10,000	4,313	4,256	4,710	4,276	4,561	4,071	5,871	4,753	62,992	5,249	52%
			8,921	5,782	6,521	4,957
LSU	Pete Maravich Assembly Center	13,215	2,353	1,665	2,011	1,746	2,020	2,525	1,765	4,333	18,418	2,302	17%
Mississippi State	Humphrey Coliseum	10,575	6,811	4,584	5,321	5,138	5,010	5,445	4,953	8,535	74,093	6,174	58%
			5,398	7,161	9,010	6,727
Missouri	Mizzou Arena	15,061	3,351	4,251	3,068	3,345	3,470	3,234	4,630	3,253	38,473	3,847	26%
			4,652	5,219
Ole Miss	The Pavilion at Ole Miss	9,500	8,302	7,042	817	1,112	6,297	873	8,229	1,155	42,257	3,521	37%
			1,018	1,323	931	5,158
South Carolina	Colonial Life Arena	18,000	13,723	12,471	12,020	13,054	11,732	13,345	13,431	12,011	160,827	13,402	74%
			14,763	12,844	13,433	18,000
Tennessee	Thompson–Boling Arena	21,678	8,869	7,553	7,818	7,311	8,004	7,187	9,651	8,663	97,531	8,867	41%
			10,023	13,436	9,016
Texas A&M	Reed Arena	12,989	3,085	2,867	3,315	3,123	2,815	3,009	3,391	7,180	53,910	3,851	30%
			3,886	4,316	3,662	5,053	4,702	3,506
Vanderbilt	Memorial Gymnasium	14,316	2,866	5,367		2,495	2,292		2,330	2,153	27,067	2,707	19%
			2,112	2,212	2,231	3,009

Postseason

SEC tournament

Main article: 2018 SEC women's basketball tournament

• February 28–March 4 at the Bridgestone Arena, Nashville, Tennessee. Teams were seeded by conference record, with ties broken by record between the tied teams followed by record against the regular season champion, if necessary.

2018 SEC women's basketball tournament seeds and results
Seed	School	Conf.	Over.	Tiebreaker	First round February 28	Second round March 1	Quarterfinals March 2	Semifinals March 3	Championship March 4
1	‡†Mississippi State	16–0	32–1		Bye	Bye	vs. #9 Kentucky W, 81–58	vs. #5 TAMU W, 70–55	vs. #2 South Carolina L, 51–62
2	†South Carolina	12–4	25–6	1–0 vs. UGA	Bye	Bye	vs. #7 Tennessee W, 73–62	vs. #3 Georgia W, 71–49	vs. #1 Mississippi State W, 62–51
3	†Georgia	12–4	25–6	0–1 vs. SC	Bye	Bye	vs. #6 Missouri W, 55–41	vs. #2 South Carolina L, 49–71
4	†LSU	11–5	19–9	1–0 vs. Missouri, 1–0 vs. UT, 1–1 vs. TAMU	Bye	Bye	vs. #5 TAMU L, 69–75
5	#Texas A&M	11–5	24–8	1–0 vs. Missouri, 1–1 vs. LSU, 1–1 vs. UT	Bye	vs. #13 Arkansas W, 82–52	vs. #4 LSU W, 75–69	vs. #1 Mississippi State L, 55–70
6	#Missouri	11–5	24–7	1–0 vs. UT, 0–1 LSU, 0–1 vs. TAMU	Bye	vs. #14 Ole Miss W, 59–50	vs. #3 Georgia L, 41–55
7	#Tennessee	11–5	24–7	1–1 vs. TAMU, 0–1 vs. LSU, 0–1 vs. Missouri	Bye	vs. #10 Auburn W, 64–61	vs. #2 South Carolina L, 62–73
8	#Alabama	7–9	17–13		Bye	vs. #9 Kentucky L, 64–79
9	#Kentucky	6–10	15–17		Bye	vs. #8 Alabama W, 79–64	vs. #1 Mississippi State L, 58–81
10	#Auburn	5–11	14–15		Bye	vs. #7 Tennessee L, 61–64
11	Florida	3–13	11–19	1–0 vs. Vanderbilt, 1–0 vs. Arkansas	vs. #14 Ole Miss L, 42–48
12	Vanderbilt	3–13	7–24	0–1 vs. UF, 0–1 vs. Arkansas	vs. #13 Arkansas L, 76–88
13	Arkansas	3–13	13–18	0–1 vs. UF, 1–0 vs. Vanderbilt	vs. #12 Vanderbilt W, 88–76	vs. #5 TAMU L, 52–82
14	Ole Miss	1–15	12–19		vs. #11 Florida W, 48–42	vs. #6 Missouri L, 50–59
‡ – SEC regular season champions, and tournament No. 1 seed † – Received a double bye in the conference tournament # – Received a single bye in the conference tournament Overall records include all games played in the tournament.

NCAA Division I women's basketball tournament

Main article: 2018 NCAA Division I women's basketball tournament

Seed	Bracket	School	First round	Second round	Sweet 16	Elite 8	Final Four	Championship
1	Kansas City	Mississippi State	vs. #16 Nicholls State W, 95–50	vs. #9 Oklahoma State W, 71–56	vs. #4 NC State W, 71–57	vs. #3 UCLA W, 89–73	vs. #1 Louisville W, 73–63OT	vs. #1 Notre Dame L, 58–61
2	Albany	South Carolina	vs. #15 NC A&T W, 63–52	vs. #10 Virginia W, 66–56	vs. #11 Buffalo W, 79–63	vs. #1 Connecticut L, 65–94
3	Lexington	Tennessee	vs. #14 Liberty W, 100–60	vs. #6 Oregon State L, 59–66
4	Albany	Georgia	vs. #13 Mercer W, 68–63	vs. #5 Duke L, 40–66
4	Spokane	Texas A&M	vs. #13 Drake W, 89–76	vs. #5 DePaul W, 80–79	vs. #1 Notre Dame L, 84–90
5	Lexington	Missouri	vs. #12 Florida Gulf Coast L, 70–80
6	Spokane	LSU	vs. #11 Central Michigan L, 69–78
# Bids: 7	W–L (%):	Total: 12–6 (.667)	5–2 (.714)	3–2 (.600)	2–1 (.667)	1–1 (.500)	1–0 (1.000)	0–0 (–)

Women's National Invitation tournament

Main article: 2018 Women's National Invitation Tournament

School	First round	Second round	Third round	Quarterfinals
Alabama (3–1)	vs. Southern W, 69–56	vs. UCF W, 80–61	vs. Georgia Tech W, 61–59	vs. Virginia Tech L, 67–74

WNBA draft

Main article: 2018 WNBA draft

Pick	Player	WNBA team	School
1	A'ja Wilson	Las Vegas Aces	South Carolina
3	Diamond DeShields	Chicago Sky	Tennessee / Çukurova (Turkey)
8	Victoria Vivians	Indiana Fever	Mississippi State
13	Jaime Nared	Las Vegas Aces	Tennessee
22	Mercedes Russell	New York Liberty	Tennessee
25	Raigyne Louis	Las Vegas Aces	LSU
27	Mackenzie Engram	Atlanta Dream	Georgia