Last year, BYU senior associate athletic director/senior woman administrator Liz Darger was named a member of the NCAA Division I Women’s Basketball Committee, meaning she had a key voice in determining the bracket for women’s March Madness.
Soon Darger will be the lead voice on that committee.
On Friday, the NCAA announced that Darger was elected to serve as the chair of the committee for the 2026-27 season. In preparation, Darger will serve as vice chair of the committee for the coming 2025-26 season.
As such, Darger will become the front-facing person when the 2027 tournament bracket is debated and ultimately released.
“It has been a privilege to serve on the Division I Women’s Basketball Committee, and I am honored by the trust my peers have placed in me to serve as vice-chair this year and chair in 2026-27. ... I am grateful for the encouragement and support of BYU Athletic Director Brian Santiago and am excited to continue serving a sport — and its student-athletes — that mean so much to me," Darger said in a statement.
Darger has served as BYU’s senior woman administrator since she began working at the school in 2015 and has become an important voice on numerous national committees.
Prior to BYU, Darger served as an assistant women’s basketball coach at Utah Valley from 2009-15 and worked at Timpanogos High near both of those universities in the 10 years prior to that.