Niele Ivey, Maddy Westbeld speak after Notre Dame beats Pittsburgh

There was more than basketball to talk about during this game.

SOUTH BEND, Ind. Notre Dame’s 78-53 win over Pittsburgh took on a slightly different tone than usual. While there was the usual happiness over beating an ACC opponent handily, that wasn’t the only thing the Irish were celebrating. This game was the annual Think Pink Game that pays tribute to cancer survivors, and many of them were on hand.

Keeping with the spirit of the day, Niele Ivey and Maddy Westbeld talked about the subject that the game was played in awareness of in addition to answering the usual questions about the game and the team. In fact, some of the questions also were about cancer affecting their personal lives and the community in general. It was the least they could do for a game like this.

Also keeping in the spirit of the dominant win, Ivey and Westbeld were very relaxed and joking during their postgame news conference. Here’s some of what they had to say:

ACC women’s basketball leaders as of Jan. 14

One Notre Dame player continues to tear up the conference.

The college basketball regular season might be half over but not the ACC season. No, we’re still getting warmed up, and the conference action continues to heat up with each passing game. The next couple of months promise to live up to the conference’s billing as one of the best in the country. You won’t want to miss it.

Here are the players to watch as of this moment:

ACC women’s basketball leaders as of Jan. 7

Guess who’s leading on Notre Dame’s behalf?

ACC play officially is in full swing. Now, we’ll really get to see what the teams are made of as they start to play each other. As that happens, we’ll get to see which players stand out the most. It might be too early to distinguish that right now, but we at least have an idea.

Here’s who continues to stand out in the conference at the moment:

Notre Dame guts out tough victory against Pittsburgh

The Irish needed everything to win this game.

Notre Dame starting its ACC schedule 0-2 really would have thrown the season off the rails. For a while, it looked like Pittsburgh might actually inflict that pain upon an Irish team ravaged by injuries. However, the Irish made sure that didn’t happen and emerged victorious over the Panthers, 71-66.

The Irish (10-2, 1-1) jumped out to a 26-6 lead in the first quarter and scored the game’s first 12 points. But the points stopped coming so frequently, and the Panthers (6-9, 0-2), led by Liatu King’s career-high 34 points and 13 rebounds, outscored the Irish, 36-19, in the second and third quarters. It did not help that in the latter of those quarters, [autotag]Natalija Marshall[/autotag] fouled out, and [autotag]Maddy Westbeld[/autotag]’s lip was badly cut, forcing her to the bench with 17 points and six rebounds.

The fourth quarter proved to be [autotag]Hannah Hidalgo[/autotag]’s time. She matched her first-quarter total of 11 points after being held to single basket in between, bringing her total scoring output to 24. She and the rest of her remaining teammates turned what had become a three-point deficit into an eight-point lead with 1:48 left. The Irish held serve from there to escape the Steel City with the win.

Also helping Hidalgo was [autotag]Anna DeWolfe[/autotag], who scored most of her 11 points on three 3-pointers. That total was one off Hidalgo’s four 3s.

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ACC women’s basketball leaders as of Dec. 24

Guess who’s leading the way on behalf of Notre Dame?

First of all, we hope you have a very Merry Christmas. We appreciate everyone who comes to our site to read our content because we wouldn’t be here without your support. Whatever reason you have to come to this site, we hope you continue to do so for a long time to come.

Now that the holiday greetings are out of the way, let’s take a look at the ACC’s major statistical category leaders:

ACC women’s basketball leaders as of Dec. 17

You probably can guess who represents Notre Dame on this list.

The ACC season has reached the middle of December. Time is running out for players to get their numbers up before conference play really begins. If they don’t do it now, it might be more difficult for them to do so. Here are those who have answered the call though:

ACC women’s basketball leaders as of Dec. 10

Guess who’s leading for Notre Dame?

ACC teams are about to get to the middle of December. Full-time conference play isn’t here yet, but it’s creeping closer. Now is the time for all teams to get their mistakes out of the way before the games really start to count. For now though, here are the players atop the major statistical leaderboards:

ACC women’s basketball leaders as of Nov. 26

One Notre Dame player leads two categories still.

We are heading into the end of November. What does this mean as far as college basketball? Not much because no conference games have been played yet, so we only are left to imagine how well the current statistical leaders will play against that competition. Until then, here are those leaders as we get close to December:

ACC women’s basketball leaders as of Nov. 19

One Notre Dame player leads two categories.

We continue to see more of who will make the ACC special this season. Even if these particular players aren’t all at the top of the statistical leaderboards at the end of the season, they still will be worth watching throughout the season. Here’s who’s most worth watching in the conference leading into Thanksgiving week:

ACC women’s basketball leaders as of Nov. 12

A couple of Irish names are on here.

College basketball season is back, and fans couldn’t be more excited. What that initially means is high statistics across the board. Even if you know these numbers won’t hold up, they still are thrilling to look at. Here are the players who posses those numbers: