The 2023 championship featured a 17-team format, with 4 regionals. Each regional consisted of four teams, except for the Arlington regional which had five with a play-in match between Fayetteville State and Prairie View. Each regional had one winner who would go on to play in a four-team tournament for the national championship.[6] The 2023 pre-determined regional locations were as follows:
Each regional was played as a double-elimination tournament, except for the one play-in match. All regional matches, except for what the NCAA calls "if necessary regional finals", were best-of-three matches bowled in the following order: five-person team, Baker total pinfall, Baker best-of-seven match play. Any "if necessary regional final" was Baker best-of-seven. Regional winners advanced to the championship event, which was also double-elimination. All matches were bowled under the standard format for regionals (best-of-three matches using specified formats in a specific order) except the championship final, which was Baker best-of-seven.[7][6]
Qualification
Since there is only one national collegiate championship for women's bowling, all NCAA bowling programs (whether from Division I, Division II, or Division III) were eligible. A total of 17 teams competed in the double-elimination tournament, with nine conference champions receiving automatic bids and eight teams receiving at-large bids. The teams were revealed in a selection show on March 29, 2023.[8][6]
Bids
There were 17 teams selected to the tournament - nine were selected automatically as conference champions, while another eight were selected at-large. The top four teams in the tournament were seeded and assigned to separate regions; they were the only teams seeded for this tournament.[9][6]
