If the first few days of the 2008-09 women's college basketball season is a barometer, it could to a chaotic odyssey to the crowning of a national champion in St. Louis.

Before the first week of the season was in the books, the No. 2, 3 and 7 teams in the Associated Press' preseason Division I poll had already suffered losses.

It began on Friday when No. 3 Maryland lost 80-68 at Texas Christian. Two days later No. 2 Stanford traveled to Baylor and lost 81-65. The next day No. 7 Tennessee, which defeated Stanford in the 2008 national championship game, lost to No. 15 Virginia 83-82 at home.

For a time in Sunday's season opener against Georgia Tech, top-ranked UConn appeared to be in danger of falling prey to the string of early upsets before pulling away late for an 11-point win.

UConn coach Geno Auriemma admitted to being somewhat stunned by some of the early results but considering the parity in the game today, it shouldn't be such a shocking development.

"It is not surprising because there are a lot of good teams out there," Auriemma said. "Especially in women's basketball, a lot of the top teams play each other. When that happens, it is going to happen. It is surprising that many would lose in the first week but I am not surprised that there are going to be those outcomes and there are going to be more of them."

The upsets can be traced to the changing recruiting landscape in the women's basketball universe. There was a time where the perception was the Connecticut and Tennessee would pick out the three, four or five players they wanted, the other top prospects would land at powerhouse programs like Rutgers, Duke, Stanford, North Carolina, Maryland and Oklahoma. Over the last couple of years, while the top programs continue to clean up in recruiting, more top players opt to head elsewhere.

A look at one recruiting database shows that neither UConn nor Tennessee has a commitment from a top 10 player. Former UConn recruiting target Kelsey Bone has yet to commit, but the other top 10 players committed to nine different programs. If that's not a sign of parity, I don't know is.

"I haven't really kept up with it so I don't know who is going where and who is doing what but I do know that there are too many good players and the gap between the top 10 and the top 20 isn't as wide as it used to be," Auriemma said. "That's one issue and the other is, I don't think kids today say the most important thing is to win a national championship. It's not like they are all going to flock to the teams who are tradition powers, they just want play. They get recruited on 'hey, why do you want to do there? You'll have to wait.' The recruiting pitch is obviously 'come play for us and help us be that.' There are more kids listening to that right now because there are more good players. It doesn't matter who gets who, there are still three, four or five schools that every year or every other year are going to get their fair share and get some of the best players."