The Division I Women's Basketball Championship selection show on ESPN, which unveils the 64-team field, will move to Monday night beginning in 2006. This will give the women's basketball community and the cable sports network a distinct night to enhance the exposure of the championship through various promotional and programming initiatives.

While the women's tournament field will be revealed a day later, there will be no change to the championship schedule. First-round competition will begin five days following the bracket announcement.

"The women's basketball committee and ESPN have been in discussions about Selection Monday for the past several years as a part of the committee's increased efforts to formulate a comprehensive plan to promote and grow the game of women's basketball during the regular season and the championship,'' said Lynn Parkes, associate director of athletics at the University of Memphis and chair the Division I Women's Basketball Committee. "The committee feels the move to Selection Monday will create enhanced exposure and serve as a growth agent for women's basketball as a whole. We value our ongoing partnership with ESPN and appreciate its efforts as we work together to benefit the sport.''

ESPN, which has used its family of networks to present all 63 games of the Division I Women's Basketball Championship since 2003, has been the exclusive television home for women's tournament games since 1996 and the women's tournament selection show since 1991. The championship's popularity reached new heights in 2004 as the national championship game between the University of Connecticut and the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, averaged 3.8 million households viewing the game to become the second-most viewed game -- men's or women's -- in the 25-year history of the sports cable network.

For 2005, the selection show will remain in its current Sunday afternoon time slot at 5 p.m. Eastern time Sunday, March 13.

In 2004, the women's selection show started at 5:27 p.m. Eastern time after the end of the men's Big 12 Conference tournament final. By contract, the women's selection show had to be off the air by 6 p.m. for SportsCenter.

In 2006, the Women's Selection Show will be a guaranteed one-hour program, starting at 7 p.m. Eastern time after SportsCenter.

Other committee actions

The Division I Women's Basketball Committee addressed other items related to the championship during its October 18-20 meeting in Indianapolis, including a determination of dates for the 2006 regionals.

The games at the Albuquerque, New Mexico, and San Antonio regionals will be held March 25 and 27, while the games at the Cleveland and Bridgeport, Connecticut, regionals will be March 26 and 28.

The committee also reviewed and made modifications to its principles and procedures that govern the selection, seeding and bracketing process to reflect the new format for the first and second rounds of the championship. For the first time beginning this year, the women's first- and second-round games will be conducted at eight sites with eight teams competing at each venue. In the past, the first and second rounds were held at 16 different sites with four teams assigned to play at each venue.

A timeline also was approved by the committee to manage the site selection for the first and second rounds and regionals in 2007 and 2008.

A specifications agreement and facility-availability questionnaire will be distributed to each Division I institution and conference office no later than December 3. The deadline for the return of the questionnaires will be January 17.

The site-selection subcommittee will identify finalists by February 14. The 2007 and 2008 first- and second-round and regional sites will be awarded in the summer of 2005 and those recommendations will be forwarded to the Division I Championships/Competition Cabinet.