Feb. 12, 2008

INDIANAPOLIS - The NCAA Division I Women's Basketball Committee has selected 17 first and second-round sites for the 2009 and 2010 NCAA Division I Women's Basketball Championship and those sites have been approved by the NCAA Division I Championships/Competition Cabinet.

Xavier University will host first and second round NCAA Tournament games in 2010 at Cintas Center in Cincinnati.  The selection will mark the first time Xavier has hosted NCAA Women's Basketball Tournament games at Cintas Center since the 2001 season.  The 2010 first and second rounds will be held from March 20-23.  

The sites were added after the NCAA Division I Women's Basketball Committee announced in the summer of 2007 that the championship would be expanding to 16 predetermined first and second-round sites beginning in 2009.

Other sites hosting the first and second rounds of the 2010 championship are Albuquerque, New Mexico; Ames, Iowa; Durham, North Carolina; Louisville, Kentucky; Norman, Oklahoma; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; Tallahassee, Florida and Seattle.

"The committee was pleased with the amount of interest generated when we announced that we were going to 16 pre-determined sites again in 2009 and 2010," said Judy Southard, senior associate director of athletics at Louisiana State University and chair of the Division I Women's Basketball Committee. "To be able to get a good blend of cities that have past hosting experience in combination with a number of new cities and venues is good for the continued growth of the game of women's basketball and our championship."