The women’s NCAA Tournament is moving on up. Next year it will play all its games on neutral sites. The theory is the game is credible enough, and its fans are faithful enough, to re-create the same excitement without playing in the favored team’s gym.

Great idea. Maybe on its way up, the women can meet the men, coming down.

The men’s tournament committee drew up its pairings Sunday and made a statement about first-round upsets. It doesn’t like them. It says it has jerry-rigged brackets to put the games closer to the fans, but it really made the first weekend just a tad easier for the teams that ESPN, CBS and ABC have forced us to watch all season.

Some teams earned their perks. Kansas is a top seed and plays in St. Louis; Oklahoma is a No. 2 and plays in Dallas; Cincinnati is a No. 1 and plays in Pittsburgh; Duke, a No. 1, is in Greenville, S.C; Maryland, a No. 1, is in Washington. Yet Texas (6) is in Dallas, Arizona (3) is in Albuquerque, and Charlotte (9) is in Greenville.

The selection board, of which Missouri Valley commissioner Doug Elgin is a member, threw a bone to Southern Illinois. But it slapped down Bowling Green and Ball State. Every year, Selection Sunday reminds us just how bad a TV-conference team must be to miss the cut. Missouri, St. John’s and Boston College jogged through the year, and they all squeezed in. The decision-makers did summon enough spine to say no to Virginia (7-10 in the ACC, 3-7 down the stretch, 2-7 against the Top 50).

But no one was outraged like Gonzaga.

It got a 6 seed, meaning the committee considers Gonzaga somewhere between No. 21 and No. 24.

What?

This team has lost once since Jan. 18. It played at Illinois, St. Joseph’s, New Mexico and Washington (no TV-league team except Washington State played at Gonzaga). It beat Indiana, a 5 seed, and Texas, a 6.

Meanwhile, Oregon was overjoyed over its second seed, a tribute to Pac-10 power. Stanford and UCLA were punished for their slovenly finishes with 8 seeds, which means dates with Kansas and Cincinnati provided they win first rounds.

Mercifully, nobody in the Big Ten was seeded higher than fourth, and Wisconsin must be the only team ever to tie for a TV-league title and get seeded eighth.

The committee’s job is ridiculously difficult, and nirvana is not the goal. Fairness is. To help, let’s institute two more rules. Twenty-five Division I victories get you in, period. And you must have a winning record in your conference (BC was 9-9).

In fact, let’s put Herman’s Hermits in the room. They didn’t know much about geography.