Niele Ivey insisted on sophomore Olivia Miles and her injured right knee hopping on the team flight Thursday to Greenville, S.C., and serving as a reminder for the rest of the Notre Dame women’s basketball team Saturday in their NCAA Tourney Sweet 16 matchup.
Not of what the third-seeded Irish (27-5) lost back on Feb. 26, but what they’ve become since.
“I felt like after Olivia went down, our toughness was what we identified,” Notre Dame’s third-year head coach said Friday morning, heading into Saturday’s 11:30 a.m. matchup with 2 seed Maryland (27-6) at Bon Secours Wellness Arena (ESPN).
“Once we found that — the team found that — they've kind of really put that on their shoulders, like, ‘OK, this is who we are.’ It took a while to figure out who were we going to be now without Olivia.
“And that was something that we had to figure out in practice. I put them in a lot of really tough situations and scenarios to try to really force them to figure out who they were. And it's something that we're still growing and learning, but I definitely feel like the resilient and tough mindset is who we are at this point.”
The Irish have definitely leaned on their defense (14th nationally in field-goal percentage defense) and rebounding (fourth in rebound margin) since their second-team All-America point guard was lost for the season. Their offensive fluidity, though, comes and goes.
They’ll likely need all of it to compete with the nation’s No. 9 scoring team (79.4), who edged the Irish 74-72 back on Dec. 1 in South Bend on a last-second shot by Maryland’s All-American Diamond Miller. The 6-3 senior guard finished that game with 31 points, 12 rebounds and five assists.
At the time, the Irish were still trying to coax consistency out of center and Texas transfer Lauren Ebo, hadn’t yet lost 3-point specialist and starting guard Dara Mabrey to her own season-ending knee injury and hadn’t yet added early enrolled freshman guard Cass Prosper to the roster.
“Some of their personnel pieces have changed, but they've really morphed into the best version of themselves,” Maryland coach Brenda Frese said. “I can't say enough about Niele and the staff, what they've been able to do through their injuries. And they just continue to keep putting their head down and finding ways to win.”
The winner of Saturday’s rematch of the Big Ten/ACC Challenge gets either fourth seed UCLA (27-9) on Monday in the Elite Eight or, more likely, No. 1-ranked and defending national champion South Carolina (34-0), playing two hours from campus.
Monday’s survivor punches a ticket to the Final Four in Dallas, March 31-April 2.
Maryland had to reinvent itself too, though a bit earlier. The Terps lost guard Ashley Owusu to Virginia Tech and forward Mimi Collins to NC State last offseason via the transfer portal, with the most painful departure being All-America center Angel Reese.
Reese at LSU this season was the nation’s fifth-leading scorer (23.8) and second-leading rebounder (15.7).
The Irish, playing in their 19th ever Sweet 16 game, are 4-1 without Miles, counting their comeback win at Louisville on Feb. 26, when they lost the 5-10 sophomore shortly before halftime.
Miles was averaging 14.3 points, 7.3 rebounds, 6.9 assists and 2.1 steals at the time,
“The first couple weeks were really hard. They were really challenging, I'm going to be honest,” Ivey said. “She struggled with it. It's her first major injury. Being away from the team, not being able to be a part of this physically has been really challenging for her mentally.
“I feel like the last week and a half, we've poured into her. I've tried to pour into her. I've been in her shoes. I've been shut down twice with an ACL and had to watch from the sideline. I've tried to be really intentional about making sure she's engaged. I'm texting her almost every day, making sure in practice.
“I'm talking to her about what did she see in practice, what did she see in the game. And on the bench she's my point guard. But after I tell the team my thoughts, my message, I'm like, ‘Make sure you go talk to Soni (makeshift point guard Sonia Citron).’
“So, she still has that voice. She still has that impact on the side, because she sees the game so well. Our team trusts her so much that she still is a valuable voice for me in the games, in the locker room and in practice.”
And so that’s why Miles’ surgery, originally scheduled for this week, was deferred. So she could make a difference this weekend and start building for next year when the Irish add high school All-Americans Hannah Hidalgo and Emma Risch.
The 5-6 Hidalgo, who will be Miles’ understudy next season and eventually her successor, averaged 28.8 points, 6.4 rebounds, 5.1 assists and 7.3 steals per game during her final year at Paul VI High School in Haddonfield, N.J.
The 6-2 Risch, an elite 3-point shooter out of Melbourne (Fla.) Palm Bay Magnet School, averaged 23.3 points, 6.4 rebounds and 4.9 assists during her senior season.
The Irish will have to find a center in the transfer portal as they did last offseason, with Ebo and Mabrey being the only two ND players with expiring eligibility.
But for now it’s all about Maryland and trying to elongate this season’s journey.
“I want her to experience this, but also I need her energy,” Ivey said of Miles. “I need her leadership. We're not here if we didn't have Olivia Miles or Dara, so I wanted to make sure she was part of this.”
Added junior forward Maddy Westbeld, “It's definitely tougher without Liv and without Dara, but like (Ivey) said, the toughness aspect and playing hard makes it really easy when you have something much bigger to play for. That's what we'll be doing.”
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