Notre Dame Women's Basketball Drops ACC Opener To Syracuse

Syracuse, NY - The Notre Dame women’s basketball team saw its nine-game winning streak come to an end in Sunday’s 86-81 loss to Syracuse in the ACC opener for both teams. The Fighting Irish (9-2, 0-1 ACC) had not lost since their season-opening loss to current No. 1 South Carolina in Paris, France on Nov. 6.

Syracuse (11-1, 1-0) jumped out to an early 7-0 lead to start the game, prompting Irish head coach Niele Ivey to call a timeout 2:12 into the game. The Irish came racing out of the timeout to tie the game 13-13. The teams went back and forth throughout the rest of the quarter, which saw the score tied 19-19 at the end of the game’s first 10 minutes.

Irish point guard Hannah Hidalgo led all scorers with nine points at the end of the quarter. She finished the game with a career-high 32 points. Hidalgo has topped 20 points in 10 of the first 11 games of her career. She scored 14 points on 6 of 10 shooting in the game’s final 10 minutes and was 14 of 29 overall with a pair of 3-pointers in the loss.

Dyaisha Fair led the Orange with 27 points in the upset. The graduate student closed the game by scoring 14 points in the fourth quarter. She hit a trio of 3-pointers from the right wing to thwart the Irish, who were outscored 25-16 in the final quarter after taking a four-point lead into the game’s final frame.

Maddy Westbeld earned her fifth double-double of the season with 16 points and 10 rebounds despite playing most of the second half in foul trouble. The senior forward had just nine double-doubles in the first three seasons of her career.

Syracuse freshman Alyssa Latham posted her team-leading fifth double-double of the season as well with 21 points and 12 rebounds before fouling out in the fourth quarter. Latham picked up her fourth foul with 3.4 seconds left in the third. She led all scorers with 19 at that point. Notre Dame closed the third quarter with a 6-0 run to take a 65-61 lead for their biggest lead of the game. Anna DeWolfe was Notre Dame’s only other double-digit scorer with 15 points.