Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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88 MARCH 2025 BLUE & GOLD ILLUSTRATED BY TYLER HORKA N otre Dame took two steps back- ward in November. As of Feb. 10, the Fighting Irish took 16 forward since then. In terms of wins and losses, that's not such a bad trade-off. Those two steps back, of course, were the Fighting Irish's consecutive losses to TCU and Utah in the Cayman Islands Classic Nov. 29-30. The 16 forward? Notre Dame's 16 consecutive wins in re- sponse to the defeats, by far the longest winning streak of Niele Ivey's five-year tenure as the head coach of her alma mater. Never have the Irish played basketball under her guidance as well as they are right now. "We learned a lot from those losses," Ivey said. "I think I learned the resil- ience of this group. We had to re-center everything we were focusing on, de- fensively, our mindset, our preparation. We start games a lot better. Everything shifted for us. I think it was a mentality, a mindset that shifted for this team. We knew our goals coming in." In the games against the Horned Frogs and Utes, those goals — a trip to the Final Four and perhaps winning the program's third national championship — seemed unattainable. How could Notre Dame win it all if they were capable of suffer- ing back-to-back losses, two in as many days, to teams that are long shots, at best, to make a trip to Tampa, Fla., in April? Well, Notre Dame is also capable of winning six games against ranked op- ponents, all by double digits. More than that, actually. After a 91-52 victory over No. 21 California Feb. 9, Notre Dame's half a dozen ranked victories came by an average margin of 16.3 points. In running their ACC record to 12-0 with that win, the Irish upped their average margin of victory in conference games to 24.8. Turns out, that's what this team is. That's who this team is; one of the very best in the nation. The TCU and Utah games are distant memories. The Irish are so far removed from them. They haven't forgotten, though, because they know that lesser version of them- selves is still in there somewhere. It's been beautifully suppressed for months now, but if it ever does surface again, that's when Notre Dame can get itself into trouble. That's when those goals can all of a sudden seem unreachable again. "The only thing that can beat us is ourselves," graduate student forward Liza Karlen said. "We don't come in, we don't take care of business, we don't take care of the ball like we should, we don't play like we know we can, we can lose. But at the same time, no one can beat us if we're playing how we play. We're the only things blocking our own success. It's a blessing and a curse." Karlen has been a blessing for Notre Dame in the sacrifice she willingly chose to make simply suiting up for the Fighting Irish. As a senior at Marquette, she averaged 17.7 points per game. She was an every-game starter and the best player on the team. At Notre Dame, she only started 7 of her first 14 games played. She averaged 6.4 points per game in 19.4 minutes of action per appearance. She played over 31 minutes per game in back-to-back seasons at Marquette. She couldn't care less about any of Sixteen Straight Wins Have The Fighting Irish Thinking Big WOMEN'S B A S K E T B A L L Head coach Niele Ivey's team was 12-0 in ACC play as of Feb. 10, and had an average margin of victory of 24.8 points per game in those contests. PHOTO BY MICHAEL MILLER "I came here because I believe that this team could win a championship." GRADUATE STUDENT FORWARD LIZA KARLEN