SOUTH BEND – That was supposed to be the continuation of a rivalry that bounced back to the days when both were in the Big East, and those high-stress affairs would unfold three times each winter, often with a conference championship on the line.
That was supposed to be a matchup of two Top 10 nationally ranked women’s basketball teams in a game that featured plenty of devastating runs and scoring swings and ties and lead changes and drama and anxiety and nerves and timeouts right up until and perhaps past the 40th minute.
That was supposed to be a game when the home team was tested like it hadn’t been tested to date, at least this season at Purcell Pavilion, where the energy of those who scrambled inside on a bone-cold night that featured a wind chill of 4 degrees would get the gym hot in a hurry.
That was supposed to be a lot of things, this Thursday matchup between No. 2 Connecticut and No. 9 Notre Dame. Few materialized, in part because the home team and a certain pint-sized point guard wouldn’t have it. Any of it. They took all of it.
Connecticut was dismissed like the other Top Five opponents on the Notre Dame schedule to date. Number three USC? Yeah, right. Number four Texas? Please. Notre Dame did so much well that it made a 79-68 win seem relatively easy. So easy. Too easy.
Next.
Instead of a basketball game – it was that for some stretches – this became a two-hour celebration of everything Irish women’s basketball. Royalty was everywhere. There was Jewell Loyd along one baseline and Arike Ogunbowale along the near sideline. Look, a few seats down from Arike, before football Marcus Freeman, there sat South Bend’s own, Skylar Diggins-Smith, back in Michiana for this moment.
Watch a Notre Dame women’s basketball game and tell yourself that you’re not going to focus on sophomore guard Hannah Hidalgo. Dare you. Odds are, Hidalgo will do something, do a lot of everything, to make you have to notice her. On Thursday, she scored 29 points, grabbed 10 rebounds and had eight assists as the Irish (8-2) trailed for all of 24 seconds, led for a staggering 38:29 and made this one look simple.
Hannah and her friends did it again. Stop the presses, right?
Backcourt mate Olivia Miles shook free the frustration of a turned left ankle suffered early in the first quarter to own the fourth. Of her 16 points, nine came in the fourth quarter. Just before halftime, Miles limped toward the locker room and smacked the west basket stanchion in frustration. You figured her night was done. It wasn’t. She wasn’t. When it was winning time, Miles was at her best, achy ankle and all.
Stop Hidalgo, and you must deal with Miles. Slow Miles, and Hidalgo keeps coming.
“I don’t know if there is a better combination of guards than those two with all the things they can hurt you with,” said Connecticut coach Geno Auriemma, who’s seen his share of guards in his 40 years to know.
The stars were stars for the Irish. There was another that few saw coming, certainly not in this one, not someone who often watched on TV as big rivalry games played out across the country the previous four years.
Graduate transfer Liatu King didn’t have many high-leverage moments in her four seasons in Oakland, when Pittsburgh never won more than 11 games in a season. Those get-up-for games were always for someone else in some other program to get up for.
This one hit differently. You could feel it in the building hours before tip. King could feel it around the locker room and Rolfs Hall days before tip. Notre Dame has already played in (and won) its share of big games this season, but this one against Connecticut was on another intensity level.
King heard all the talk about it. UConn. She saw all the video clips of past clashes. She listened as head coach Niele Ivey shared memories of so many games gone by.
“I’m like, ‘Yo, this is real,’” King said. “It’s surreal, honestly. It’s very special.”
It was enough to send anyone into a shell. Not King. She stared it all down with 16 points and 12 rebounds. Every time it seemed the Irish need a hustle play, a dirty-work play, a get-the-crowd on their-feet play, King delivered. Like the steal she dug out late in the second half that kick-started an Irish break.
“I knew she was going to be the X factor tonight,” Ivey said. “She was amazing. She’s built for these moments so I’m happy the world saw what we know.”
How could King be built for a moment like this, if she never really experienced a moment like this?
“When I come out, I want to compete,” she said. “I want to be successful. I want my team to be successful. I want to be a great teammate.”
Not happy with just that steal, Kings busted it down the floor and made a beeline to the basket. She handled a Hidalgo pass and flipped in a left-handed layup to again bring the crowd to its collective feet. Was that eruption No. 10? Eleven? You lost count on this night.
King’s bucket put the Irish up by 10 and kind of/sort of told the Huskies, not tonight. Get back on the plane and go back to the Northeast with this L. Love, the Irish.
Notre Dame showed us something over these three wins over 19 days. It can play the best. It can beat the best. Is it too late to call top-ranked UCLA? Maybe swap out one last non-conference game and get together with No. 3 South Carolina? Hey, No. 4 LSU, you busy next week?
Sitting in an empty arena, you realized late Thursday that it’s going to be some time before we see this level of hoops between Noter Dame and another elite team again. Maybe in March.
Winter around here just got a lot longer.
Follow South Bend Tribune and NDInsider columnist Tom Noie on X (formerly Twitter): @tnoieNDI. Contact Noie at tnoie@sbtinfo.com
