South Carolina’s NET drop scratches heads after win vs Texas

The latest NCAA NET rankings are raising eyebrows.

Dec 7, 2025; Columbia, South Carolina, USA; South Carolina Gamecocks head coach Dawn Staley directs her team against the North Carolina Central Eagles in the first half at Colonial Life Arena. Mandatory Credit: Jeff Blake-Imagn Images | Jeff Blake-Imagn Images

It's no secret that the SEC is the strongest women's college basketball conference in terms of quality teams and competitive density. This is proven by the fact that there are five SEC teams in the top 10 of the most recent AP rankings and nine SEC teams in the top 25. That is a staggering amount for one conference.

There are positives and negatives to playing in such an elite conference. The positives are that it provides an opportunity to play against other national championship contenders constantly before the winner-take-all stakes of the NCAA tournament in March, thus allowing coaches the chance to see where their squad stacks up compared to their competitors.

However, this can also be seen as a negative, especially when one of these teams is in the midst of a grueling stretch. This was the case with the Texas Longhorns last week, as they played consecutive road contests against No. 6-ranked LSU and No. 2-ranked South Carolina and lost both games.

Texas head coach Vic Schaefer made his frustration apparent about this scheduling, which became a relatively big story within the college basketball community.

Jan 18, 2026; Austin, Texas, USA; Texas Longhorns head coach Vic Schaefer talks to guard Bryanna Preston (1)during the first quarter against the Texas A&M Aggies at Moody Center. Mandatory Credit: Dustin Safranek-Imagn Images | Dustin Safranek-Imagn Images

South Carolina-Texas flip in NCAA NET rankings raises eyebrows

While Texas's two losses might impact their place in the next AP rankings, it somehow helped them in the most recent NCAA NET rankings (which are what seeding for the NCAA tournament is based on), which were released on January 19.

These rankings show Texas and South Carolina swapping places from last week's NET rankings, with Texas moving to No. 3 and South Carolina dropping to No. 4, despite Texas having lost to South Carolina and LSU in the past week.

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It's worth noting that the NET rankings, per the NCAA's website, "includes more components than just winning percentage. It takes into account game results, strength of schedule, game location, net offensive and defensive efficiency, and the quality of wins and losses."

In other words, the fact that South Carolina played two elite opponents back-to-back actually helped them rather than harmed them with these rankings, despite them losing both games.

This logic isn't going to make South Carolina or LSU fans any less upset about their squad being placed behind the Longhorns, especially if this shows up in the seeding for the NCAA tournament in March.

But there's still plenty of time for that to change, especially since these teams will likely see each other in the SEC Tournament.