By Zach Kenitzer
The University of Louisville’s women’s basketball team defeated the Notre Dame Fighting Irish 61-51 in one of the most anticipated games of the season.
While Notre Dame (10-5, 1-3) entered Freedom Hall on Saturday with a three-game losing streak, they were still ranked 19th in the nation and were 11th heading into the Big East season. The Lady Cards (12-3, 3-1) showed early on that they were not intimidated.
The Irish struck first with a close shot in the paint, but the Cards immediately responded with Connie Neal’s three-point opening shot. For the next seven minutes, the Cards and Irish battled it out, but after a few forced turnovers and several rebounds, the Lady Cards broke into a 15-point run.
The Cards led 30-15 at half time and dominated through much of the second half.
Louisville jumped out to a 20-point advantage on a shot that summed up the night for Notre Dame. The ball swirled around in the hoop several times before draining all the hopes of the Irish. The Cards extended their advantage to almost 30 points before the Irish mounted a comeback to pull within 10 points as the buzzer sounded.
The Cards outrebounded Notre Dame 55-29 and held them scoreless for more than 10 minutes during the first half.
“I think it was individual effort, but it was several people on our team,” Louisville Head Coach Tom Collen said. “Probably the two main people that stepped up were Jazz [Covington] and Angel [McCoughtry]. Any flourishes for anybody are big, but certainly it was good for her [Jazz’s] confidence.”
The two combined for 31 of the team’s 61 points. Covington had 21 points and 10 rebounds. Covington’s performance came just days after she was named a candidate for the Naismith Trophy, the most prestigious award for any basketball player.
With the loss, Notre Dame will most likely drop out of the top 25 after losing four out of their last five games. They had been in the top 25 for 28 straight weeks.
“Obviously, it was a good win for us,” Collen said. “Notre Dame is a program with a storied tradition, and they’re a good basketball team. I know they didn’t look as good in the first half, but I would like to think that we had a little bit of something to do with that. So, it was a great win for us.”
Up next for the women’s basketball team is Georgetown at Freedom Hall at 7 p.m. on Jan. 18.
