Notre Dame advances in NCAA Tournament with blowout of Southern Utah

Notre Dame didn’t need any luck of the Irish this St. Patrick’s Day. A shorthanded squad playing without its starting backcourt duo had plenty of talent in the tank to advance in the NCAA Tournament without it.

The No. 3 seed Fighting Irish took care of No. 14 seed Southern Utah, 82-56, at Purcell Pavilion on Friday. The Thunderbirds’ first-ever tournament appearance only lasted 40 minutes. In essence, it was a formality after five. Playing in front of a home crowd in the tournament for the first time since 2019, Notre Dame scored 16 points before Southern Utah scored any.

“You can tell there was a little bit of nerves,” Southern Utah head coach Tracy Sanders said.

For Notre Dame? Nope.

A small contingent of over-zealous T-Bird supporters energetically applauded their team’s first NCAA Tournament bucket in NCAA Tournament history. Irish fans would need to rack their brains for 31-year-old memories to do that. Notre Dame only outscored SUU 11-10 in the second half of the first quarter. But the damage had already been done. The lead was already insurmountable. The work was business. The Irish went up by as many as 33 and cruised right into the round of 32.

Notre Dame made 10 of its first 11 shot attempts. Freshman guard Cassandre Prosper had the lone miss stuffed at the rim. She regained control of the ball and put it up and in for two points. It was that kind of game from the beginning for the Irish. In March, strong starts go a long way. Especially for higher seeds not looking to give lower seeds any semblance of hope.

“I thought it was imperative we came out that way,” Notre Dame head coach Niele Ivey said. “We have not played in two weeks, and it showed the growth over the last two weeks with what we have worked on and establishing who we are.”

The only thing the Thunderbirds won all afternoon was the mascot dance-off before the start of the fourth quarter. That’s probably inconsequential news to Ivey. She was far too focused on getting the most of a team that’s missing guards Olivia Miles and Dara Mabrey because of knee injuries.

Notre Dame played for the third time without Miles, who’s out for the season with a knee injury. Mabrey has been out with a torn ACL since Jan. 22. The formula for success with the Irish’s star sophomore point guard sidelined had previously been heavy doses of fellow sophomore guard Sonia Citron. Friday, it was junior forward Maddy Westbeld who gave the Irish a shot in the arm. A usual 11-point per game contributor, Westbeld scored a game-high 20. Fifteen of those came in the first half when she made seven of her first nine shot attempts.

“It started on defense,” Westbeld said. “And that’s what [Ivey] has been emphasizing, just getting on a running transition, getting stops early, getting rebound and running. So that we did a really good job at the beginning, and I think that’s just what set the tone early.”

Citron, meanwhile, was a little off with her shot all day. She finished just shy of her average 14.7 points per game with 14, but she went 6-of-15 from the field (40 percent). She went into the game making 49.5 percent of her attempts. Citron led Notre Dame with 6 assists, though. Three of those helpers went to Westbeld. Four of them came in the first quarter.

Notre Dame enacted a point guard by committee with Miles watching from the bench. The Irish assisted on 24 of 36 made field goals, which tied a season-high team assist total. Five players had at least three helpers. Westbeld and freshman guard KK Bransford had 5 apiece.

The Irish pushed pace at the direction of Ivey. Even Prosper brought the ball up the floor on multiple occasions. She had three assists, as did graduate student center Lauren Ebo. Notre Dame had a considerable size advantage, which enabled plenty of pocket passes. There wasn’t a player on the floor who couldn’t set up another for a score.

“I have talked a lot about playing the right way for me is being unselfish and finding the open player,” Ivey said. “Teams are going to do a lot of different things against us, sometimes double team. So being aware of that and finding the mismatches, again just playing unselfish. And I thought we did a great job of that today.”

The competition will be stiffer Sunday. The Irish will face either No. 6 seed Creighton or No. 11 seed Mississippi State with a second-straight trip to the Sweet 16 on the line. Odds are Notre Dame won’t be dribbling out the clock with the ball in the hands of walk-on Sarah Cernugel against the Bluejays or Bulldogs. But if that was the case, it wouldn’t surprise Ivey. Her Irish have overcome a lot already. What’s one more resounding win in front of a home crowd at Purcell Pavilion?

“To see where we are now with the adversity with the resilience of this group, the toughness that they have shown over the last month, several weeks, with our injuries, I’m super proud,” Ivey said. “You have to kind of trend that way.”