What happened? How Notre Dame women's basketball suffered another blowout loss to Louisville

Notre Dame had nothing left to do but play for pride. And that’s exactly what the Fighting Irish did.

Pick a first-half scoreline, any first-half scoreline. None of them were favorable for the home team against No. 4 Louisville on Sunday afternoon. 18 to 1? 31 to 3? 41 to 4? 48 to 6? Those were all real deficits for the Domers. That exact collection of numbers actually existed before a befuddled, bewildered and beleaguered crowd at Purcell Pavilion.

Notre Dame trailed 54-15 at halftime. Louisville connected on its first seven shots from the floor. Notre Dame missed its first seven. The Cardinals also made the first seven three-pointers they hoisted, all of which came in the first quarter. The Irish missed their first six shots from beyond the arc.

A dizzying dichotomy of makes and misses.

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The second half wasn’t quite a complete turnaround, but there was definitely a drastic shift in game flow. Notre Dame did most of the shot-making. The Irish seldom misfired, shooting a blistering 62% from the floor. As a result, they somehow lost to Louisville by fewer points, 86-64, than they did exactly two weeks prior (73-47).

BOX SCORE: No. 4 Louisville 86, No. 14 Notre Dame 64

Louisville (25-3, 16-2 ACC) might have eased up a bit, but it didn’t fully stop trying. The Cardinals had more starters on the court than Notre Dame (21-7, 13-5) for portions of the fourth quarter. The Irish still won the final frame 30-15. A game that seemed surely headed for Notre Dame’s most lopsided loss in who knows how long didn’t even end up being the Irish’s worst defeat of the season, one that has had far more ups than downs as tournament time dawns.

There is something to be said for that. And it goes back to playing for that word that starts with the letter “p.”

“It was more about our pride, our fight, being competitive,” head coach Niele Ivey said. “[At halftime] I talked to them about what it means to wear a Notre Dame jersey. What it means to play here at Notre Dame. No matter what, I wanted them to come out with that fight and that pride of knowing the magnitude of being a Notre Dame women’s basketball player. We weren’t playing our game.”

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There is no sugarcoating the start. Notre Dame was outplayed, out-hustled and, quite frankly, out-coached. Louisville head coach Jeff Walz didn’t have to do much to watch threes rain in from all over the floor, but he was on the sidelines commanding his team while up 40 like the Cards were losing by 10. Ivey was always fully engaged, too, but with far different results to show for it.

Notre Dame did not match Louisville’s intensity from the opening tip. And it caught up with the Irish in a hurry. The game was over before anyone in gold could do anything about it. Rebounding stats often define how hard each team is working, and the Cardinals held a 26-8 advantage in that category at halftime.

It wasn’t just prolific shooting that did Notre Dame in. It was everything.

“Adversity hit us so tough that it was really hard for us to get into our game,” Ivey said. “And it took us a minute to really find ourselves. We were missing free throws, missing layups — everything unraveled at one point. They attacked us from the beginning of the game. That got us on our heels, unfortunately.”

“We came out and were not used to getting hit that long,” graduate senior center Maya Dodson added.

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Dodson was one of four Irish players to score in double figures with 12 points, but none of those performances particularly stood out. If any did, freshman combo guard Sonia Citron scored eight of her 10 points at the free throw line. She also secured a team-high eight rebounds. Notre Dame only had 20 as a team. Louisville had 40.

Three different Cardinals scored at least 17 points led by 20 apiece from sophomore guard Hailey Van Lith and senior guard Kianna Smith. That duo made six of Louisville’s eight threes. They were ready for the moment. Notre Dame, not so much.

But at least now, after two losses by 20-plus points to Louisville in the last two weeks, Notre Dame knows how it stacks up against the cream of the crop in the conference with the ACC Tournament beginning later this week.

The bottom line? The Irish have to be better. Much better.

“It’s an awareness of where we have to be,” Ivey said. “When we compete against teams like Louisville, top five in the country, it’s the next level. You have to raise your game to a higher level. Unfortunately you have to go through it sometimes. Having that bad taste in our mouth today, I hope it fuels us as we play the rest of this season. It’s 0-0 on Friday. We did our job to get to a double-bye, and now we have to use this loss and the way that we lost, learn from it and let it fuel us the rest of the way.”

Postgame notes

• Both teams were assessed two intentional fouls apiece for a small skirmish in the second quarter. Notre Dame freshman point guard Olivia Miles and Louisville senior guard Mykasa Robinson exchanged words after a play at the rim, and Miles shoved Robinson. Notre Dame senior guard Dara Mabrey entered the fray and shoved a Louisville player. Van Lith shoved a Notre Dame player. All four players involved received personal fouls. The score was 48-10 at the time of the altercations.

– Ivey’s full quote on the situation: “There was a foul and some pushing back and forth. Apparently, Dara must have touched her and pushed her. I obviously don’t condone that. Maybe just the emotion, frustration — it was probably more of a frustration situation. Never like that. Don’t want the game to get ugly. We had two fouls, they had two fouls. The ref said we’re just going to move on. They got intentional fouls for that. It’s the part of the game you don’t want to see. You want to keep the game clean. We were kind of frustrated in that moment, but hopefully it’s a teaching point. I brought the team over and talked to them about playing the right way. That’s a big thing for me. No matter what the score is, you got to play the right way. Have to learn from that.”

• Notre Dame will either be the No. 3 or No. 4 seed in the ACC Tournament. If Virginia Tech loses to NC State on Sunday night, the Irish will be the No. 3 seed. If the Hokies pull an upset, the Irish will be the No. 4 seed. Either way, Notre Dame will begin postseason play on Friday.