Tag: Diamond Miller

15 players invited to attend the 2023 WNBA draft

While over 100 players declared for the WNBA draft, only 15 prospects were invited to attend the draft in person.

The 2023 WNBA draft will air live on ESPN starting at 7 p.m. ET on Monday. While over 100 players declared, only 15 prospects were invited to attend the draft in person in Spring Studios, located in the Tribeca section of New York.

South Carolina forward Aliyah Boston, Maryland guard Diamond Miller, Stanford guard/forward Haley Jones and Villanova forward Maddy Siegrist are among some of the top prospects invited to attend.

The other prospects who will be in attendance are forward Laeticia Amihere (South Carolina), guard Brea Beal (South Carolina), guard Grace Berger (Indiana), guard Zia Cooke (South Carolina), guard Jordan Horston (Tennessee), guard/forward Ashley Joens (Iowa State), forward Dorka Juhász (Connecticut), guard/forward Lou Lopez Sénéchal (Connecticut), guard Taylor Mikesell (Ohio State), guard Alexis Morris (LSU), and forward/center Stephanie Soares (Iowa State).

In preparation for the draft, ESPN2 will broadcast the WNBA Draft Preview Show on April 8 at 11:30 a.m. EDT and re-air it on ESPN2 at 6 p.m. EDT. LaChina Robinson will host the 30-minute special with analyst Rebecca Lobo.

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South Carolina’s Kamilla Cardoso had a priceless unfazed reaction to Diamond Miller’s blatant flop

You just know a flop when you see one.

There were plenty of notable points to undefeated South Carolina women’s basketball’s 86-75 win over Maryland. Another dynamite performance from Aliyah Boston (22 points, 10 rebounds, five assists). Meanwhile, Dawn Staley, predictably, kept it classy before even deigning to talk about Iowa in the Final Four.

But likely lost in the shuffle of victory was an exchange between the Gamecocks’ Kamilla Cardoso and Maryland’s Diamond Miller. As Miller tried to establish positioning on Cardoso, the South Carolina forward gave her a light push, with all things considered.

Yet, Miller went flying. Hilariously, Cardoso didn’t even bother arguing the obvious flop as she just stood in place, letting her arm hang before Miller got back up and regathered herself.

Incredible. Note what seems to be a slight smile on Miller’s face as she approaches Cardoso again. Talk about not getting away with one with a seasoned veteran on the best team in the country.

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Niele Ivey, Sonia Citron, Maddy Westbeld speak after Notre Dame loss

Here’s what was said in the final postgame news conference of the season.

For the second straight season, Notre Dame has gone out in the Sweet 16 during the NCAA Tournament. With the Irish’s bigs in foul trouble during the third quarter, it only was a matter of time before Maryland took advantage of a team that had no real remaining strength. That’s exactly what happened in a 76-59 Terrapins victory. All [autotag]Niele Ivey[/autotag] can do now is build a better team for next year and hope it will stay healthy – something this year’s team couldn’t do.

Ivey spoke after the Irish’s final game of the season alongside [autotag]Sonia Citron[/autotag] (14 points, seven rebounds) and [autotag]Maddy Westbeld[/autotag] (nine points, five rebounds). Had All-American point guard [autotag]Olivia Miles[/autotag] been able to play, there is little doubt that she would have taken part in the season’s last postgame news conference. Alas, she will have to hope that she’s able to do it next year, hopefully just after winning a national championship.

Here is some of what Ivey, Citron and Westbeld had to say:

Foul trouble dooms Notre Dame against Maryland in NCAA Tournament

The road has ended for the 2022-23 Irish.

With no [autotag]Olivia Miles[/autotag] or [autotag]Dara Mabrey[/autotag], Notre Dame relied heavily on its frontcourt for the NCAA Tournament. The problem with that is you only can succeed that way when the frontcourt is able to play.

When [autotag]Kylee Watson[/autotag] and [autotag]Lauren Ebo[/autotag] both picked up their fourth fouls during the third quarter of the Irish’s Sweet 16 game against Maryland, the bottom fell out of what had been a competitive contest. With [autotag]Niele Ivey[/autotag] forced to preserve Watson and Ebo for when they really might be needed, the Terrapins ended the quarter on a 13-1 run and never looked back in a 76-59 win, ending the Irish’s season.

The Irish (27-6) scored 13 unanswered points in the second quarter to take their biggest lead at eight. They remained in front by one at halftime but didn’t lead after that. While they tied the score five times in the third quarter, the smaller lineup they were forced to go to with their bigs in foul trouble ultimately caught up with them.

Diamond Miller and Shyanne Sellers combined to lead the guard-heavy Terrapins (28-6) with 30 of their 45 second-half points. They led by as much as 22 late in the fourth quarter as they punched their ticket to the Elite Eight.

After slow first halves, Miller and Sellers with 18 points apiece, and Sellers also had a game-high eight assists. Lavender Briggs scored 12 points in 25 minutes off the bench. Abby Meyers had 11 points and tied Miller for the team lead in steals with four. That gave Meyers and Miller eight of the Terrapins’ 15 steals.

[autotag]Sonia Citron[/autotag] lived up to her reputation as the Irish’s all-purpose player with 14 points and seven rebounds, but she also committed four turnovers. [autotag]KK Bransford[/autotag] led the Irish with seven assists but had four turnovers of her own. [autotag]Maddy Westbeld[/autotag] scored nine points but tied [autotag]Cassandre Prosper[/autotag] with a team-high five turnovers before fouling out. Ebo fouled out with seven points in her final college game.

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Tale of the Tape: Individual Leaders – Notre Dame vs. Maryland

The Irish are missing a key cog in this matchup. Try and guess who.

During the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament, [autotag]Niele Ivey[/autotag] described [autotag]Sonia Citron[/autotag] as Notre Dame’s all-purpose player. Ivey surely would have said that even before [autotag]Olivia Miles[/autotag] went down. If you need any evidence of that, look no further than the below chart. With Miles unavailable, Citron has assumed the leader title for a few prominent statistical categories, and there is no doubt that whether the Irish beat Maryland in the Sweet 16 will depend largely on her.

The Terrapins have their own all-purpose player in Diamond Miller. She dealt the Irish their first loss of the season when she beat the buzzer at Purcell Pavilion. There is no doubt that everything the Terrapins do runs through the Second Team All-American, and the Irish will have to battle her without Miles, also a Second Team All-American. That automatically puts the Irish at a disadvantage, but as March Madness has proved time and again, anything can happen.

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Kevin Durant was impressed by Maryland’s ‘killer’ Diamond Miller after she drained a sweet game-winner to upset Notre Dame

Diamond Miller showed us her best Dirk Nowitzki impression.

Diamond Miller silenced the crowd in South Bend, Indiana and any critics she or the Maryland Terrapins might have had Thursday night.

With 15 seconds left in one of the final ACC/Big Ten Challenge games, No. 20 Maryland was tied 72-72 on the road with No. 7 Notre Dame. The Terps had the ball, and quite a bit was on the line for them.

Maryland tumbled six spots in the most recent AP Top 25 Poll after losing to unranked DePaul. Another defeat could have bounced them from the national ranking – and Maryland has been ranked in every single AP Top 25 Poll since 2011. It’s the third-longest streak in the country behind UConn and Baylor.

But Maryland wouldn’t falter again. They put the ball in the hands of their best playmaker – someone who is likely to be a top five WNBA Draft pick this spring.

Shyanne Sellers dribbled a bit, then gave the ball up to Miller just inside the top of the key. After bobbling it, Miller settled, took six dribbles as she drove to her left, pulled up off a crossover, leaned back on her left leg and let the ball fly.

Swish. Buzzer. Game. Terps.

It looked like Miller pulled the move straight out of Dirk Nowitzki’s highlight reel. Even Maryland native Kevin Durant thought it was wildly impressive.

Maryland improved to 7-2 with the victory, and the Terps got their second win of the season over a ranked opponent. Miller had a double-double in that game too, a win over Baylor.

It was the first time Maryland had beaten a top 10 team on the road since 2016, when they topped then-No. 7 Louisville. For Notre Dame, it was the Irish’s first loss of the season.

“At that point, we knew the ball was going to go to Diamond, who had the hot hand,” Maryland coach Brenda Frese said after the game. “She executed it to perfection.”

The historic win for Maryland was made possible by Miller, who finished with 31 points, 12 boards and five assists – leading the Terps in each category.

“I just wanted to take the last shot. I didn’t want them to get another possession,” Miller said. “I just kind of got to my spot and shot it… This is what we do at Maryland. You come here to play in these big-time games.”

Under Frese, Maryland now has 26 wins over AP top 10 teams.

Miller was flattered to get a shoutout from Durant on Twitter. When she was asked about it, she took the opportunity to make a simple point: If folks want to see more ballers like her and more fun finishes like this, they should watch more women’s basketball.

“That is really, really cool. Wow. That is something I have to process later. The fact that he’s in the NBA and that he supports women’s basketball is really huge,” Miller said. “We’re just going to keep growing the game and people need to watch us because we all can ball and we all are talented. Just because we’re women doesn’t mean we’re less than any man.”

Maryland lost three starters from last season’s team to the transfer portal this past offseason. Frese then rebuilt the roster around Miller. This game showed that as long as Miller is healthy, folks shouldn’t overlook the Terps when considering contenders.

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Notre Dame suffers first loss on Maryland buzzer-beater

That was gut-wrenching.

There are ways to pick up your first loss of the season that don’t break your heart. That won’t be the case for this year’s Notre Dame squad thanks to how its final ACC-Big Ten Challenge game ended. No. 20 Maryland’s Diamond Miller scored the final two of her game-high 31 points on a pull-up jumper near the left elbow off a screen just as time expired. The basket gave the Terrapins a 74-72 win and prompted Miller to shush the Purcell Pavilion crowd.

It was a game that went back and forth until the very end. [autotag]Olivia Miles[/autotag] completed a three-point play with 48 seconds left to give the No. 7 Irish (6-1) a 70-69 lead. Miller immediately followed that with a basket in the paint, prompting [autotag]Niele Ivey[/autotag] to call a timeout. After the huddle broke, Miles missed a layup that [autotag]Lauren Ebo[/autotag] couldn’t rebound cleanly, and the Terrapins (7-2) called a timeout to maintain possession.

Miller was fouled after the subsequent inbound pass, but she only was able to split two free throws. Ivey called her final timeout to draw up a play to tie the game or potentially give the Irish the lead. Miles inbounded the ball and found a wide-open [autotag]Sonia Citron[/autotag] for a game-tying layup. The Terrapins took a timeout after that, setting the stage for Miller’s heroics.

Miller did a lot more than hit the game-winner at the buzzer. In addition to being the game’s leading scorer, she had a game-high 12 rebounds and a team-high five assists. Only Shyann Sellers joined Miller in double-digit scoring with 17 points.

Citron completed a double-double for the Irish with 24 points and 10 rebounds. Miles scored 14 and had a game-high seven assists. [autotag]Kylee Watson[/autotag] scored 10 and blocked three shots.

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Contact/Follow us @IrishWireND on Twitter, and like our page on Facebook to follow ongoing coverage of Notre Dame news, notes, and opinions.

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