SOUTH BEND, Ind. — Rally from nine points down in the fourth quarter.
Recover from an awful turnover in the final seconds.
Then halt a rival’s six-game winning streak against you with a shot at the buzzer — in overtime.
Kind of what classic college basketball games are all about.
No. 10-ranked Notre Dame and 5-foot-10 sophomore point guard Olivia Miles delivered every time the drama peaked in a terrific showdown in front of 5,245 against Louisville at Purcell Pavilion on Thursday night.
Her step-back 18-footer from the right wing, after accepting the ball and a screen from 6-4 teammate Kylee Watson near the top of the key, gave the Irish a 78-76 victory — sweeter because it stopped the Cardinals’ streak over the Irish that included two blowouts last season.
“I'm almost speechless, because that was just a moment,” third-year head coach Niele Ivey said, her club 21-4 and 12-3 in the Atlantic Coast Conference, tied for first place with Duke following its loss to Virginia Tech Thursday night.
“In the last couple of minutes I told the team it's time for us to separate ourselves, and that shot is what you call separation. That was unbelievable.”
Don’t ask Miles, who came within an assist of her fourth career triple-double, to describe it.
“I don't know, I just blacked out,” Miles said with a smile when asked to describe the shot. “I don't know what just happened. I just blacked out and I don't remember it, really.”
Replays will take care of that. It’s certain to go up on the Purcell Pavilion video board shortly.
But Notre Dame, which recovered after trailing for almost 30 minutes, shouldn’t have needed Miles’ shot at the end to stop unranked Louisville (19-9, 10-5 ACC).
A layup by Watson, who turned in her second straight high-end performance with 20 points (8-for-8 from field), gave the Irish a 74-72 lead with 1:23 to play in overtime.
Then, after a missed 3-pointer by Josie Williams, only her 20th 3-point attempt of the year, with a minute to go, the Irish got possession following a tie-up on the rebound.
On ND’s possession, Maddy Westbeld missed a 3-pointer, but gathered in the rebound. The ball went inside to Watson, who attracted a lot of attention near the free throw line. In a tangle of arms, she slipped a pass to Cass Prosper, who got behind the defense for a layup and foul. She missed the free throw, but ND had a 76-72 lead with just 15 seconds to go.
It was too much time in a game that had 14 ties and 13 lead changes.
Hailey Van Lith, the Cardinals’ 5-7 dynamo, went the distance with the perimeter rebound for a layup and her 18th and 19th points — her season average — with nine seconds to go.
Miles then took the inbounds from Sonia Citron and tried to dribble out of trouble along the baseline, but the ball went off her hands and out of bounds for her sixth turnover.
The review by officials confirmed it.
On the inbounds play for the Cardinals, 6-3 Olivia Cochran got off a shot underneath, under duress, and it fell through with 3.8 seconds to go.
“That was a pretty frustrating play for me,” Miles said. “And like coach Ivey said, you’ve just got to keep level-headed. … I had to step up, because I had just messed up in the play before. So, I was happy that I was able to bounce back.”
The Irish took a timeout to set up the final shot.
“The play actually worked out how it was supposed to,” Miles said. “It was really for me to drive, but the bigs moved out high, so I kind of had to go around them and that didn't give me enough time to get to the rim, so I just shot it.”
After a quiet first half of just five points, Miles got aggressive. She had 11 points in the third quarter — four from the free-throw line as she started drawing contact while driving to the basket.
Even better for the Irish — on a day they welcomed back center Lauren Ebo for a few minutes from a five-game rest because of a lower leg injury — was the play of Watson, who came in averaging just 6.3 points a game, but now has 35 points combined in her last two contests.
She took over inside when the Irish fell behind 62-53 following Chrislyn Carr’s 3-pointer with 7:49 to play.
In a stretch of less than three minutes, her rebound bucket, a duck-and-under move for a layup and another shot from close range made it 64-62 with 4:42 to play.
“It starts with Kylee,” Ivey said. “For the second game in a row, just her confidence. She went 8-for-8. She just played so tough and she did exactly what we needed to do defensively. Just unbelievable.”
Watson, a transfer from Oregon, was expected to make a larger impact inside when she arrived. But it’s been slow in coming.
Ivey gushed about her motor and work in the paint in practice, but it just recently has begun to emerge.
She has struggled considerably from the free throw line — she came into Thursday’s game at 49% from the line for the season — but she went 4-for-7 Thursday and 5-for-7 in last Sunday’s win over Syracuse.
“I feel like a lot of it's just mental for me,” Watson said. “I'm just coming and playing with confidence and not really caring what other people may say, and just playing for my teammates. I’m just kind of letting the game come to me.
“And I've been playing with such good guards and everyone else on the team. They make it really easy for me, and (opponents) need to (defend) them, so I get a little bit more open space to go to work.”
Watson’s performance was especially critical with Westbeld, averaging 11 a game, held scoreless (0-for-5) until the fourth quarter.
Her first bucket was a three-point play on a short turnaround in the lane that tied the score at 68 with 1:13 to go in regulation. She followed with a layup on a feed from Miles with 44 seconds to go to give ND a 70-68 lead.
The Irish couldn’t protect it as Van Lith dropped in a 15-footer with 27 seconds to go.
On ND’s final possession of regulation, Citron (15 points) drove to the right side of the bucket, but was met with a lot of traffic and her shot wasn’t close with two seconds to go.
Citron, a 50% shooter from the field for the season, was just 6-for-18. Some of it may have been fatigue. She played 43:33 of the 45 minutes and spent most of it chasing the energetic Van Lith.
KK Bransford gave the Irish a fourth player in double figures with 10.
“There's a lot of contribution from a lot of different players,” Ivey said. “(Defenses) can’t be locked in on one player, and that's the beauty of having so much balance on this team. You really can't stop one person. And I just love the confidence and the swag that we're playing with. And I thought that really helped us.”
Curiously, each team shot exactly 48.4% from the field and each team had 17 turnovers.
The Irish, who rank fourth in the country in rebound margin at plus-11.4, were outrebounded, 36-33. Miles led the Irish with 11 rebounds and Watson had three of Notre Dame’s 11 offensive rebounds.
The two teams get to do it all again on Feb. 26 at Louisville. The Irish certainly are hoping Ebo will be ready for more minutes.
She spent the first half riding a stationary bike, then entered the game to a loud greeting from the crowd at the 8:10 mark of the third quarter.
She made her only shot, and had three rebounds but played just five minutes. She came in averaging 9.9 points and seven rebounds.
“It's so hard watching her on the sideline,” Ivey said. “She's our energy. Her being a grad senior, you know she wants to play for this team. So I know it's so hard and so frustrating for her to be sitting out, but so happy that she's been progressing positively.
“I credit the performance team for doing a phenomenal job of getting her back. We’re trying to slowly give her a little bit more minutes … you know this team plays for each other, so I know they were all really excited that she just got a chance to be on the floor.”
The Irish will play at Pittsburgh, against the ACC’s last-place team, on Sunday at 2 p.m. (EST).
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