This weekend, the Notre Dame hockey and women’s basketball teams will begin their Big Ten and ACC Tournaments, respectively. Both teams will begin play on Friday, with the Irish women competing as the No. 2 seed in Greensboro, North Carolina, and the icers headed to the University of Minnesota as the No. 7 seed.
Women’s basketball
Two weeks ago, Notre Dame appeared a lock for the No. 1 seed in the ACC Tournament. However, consecutive losses to NC State on Feb. 23 and Florida State on Feb. 27 bumped head coach Niele Ivey and the Irish down to the second seed. Nevertheless, they returned to form in Sunday’s 72-59 defeat of Louisville, capturing a share of the ACC regular season title with NC State and finishing 25-4 overall with a 16-2 record in conference play.
Last season, Notre Dame entered the ACC Tournament as the No. 4 seed – the last team to earn a double bye straight to the quarterfinals – and won the whole thing to earn a No. 2 seed for the NCAA Tournament. Along the way, the Irish knocked off two teams that had previously beaten them, Louisville and NC State, in addition to overall No. 1 seed Virginia Tech. The backcourt duo of Hannah Hidalgo and Sonia Citron, respectively a freshman and junior at the time, led the Irish by each averaging 19 points per game.
This year’s top four seeds are NC State at No. 1, Notre Dame at No. 2, Duke at No. 3 and Florida State at No. 4. Notre Dame may have gained an easier path as the second seed by drawing a Duke team on its side of the bracket which it already beat handily and potentially forcing its two losses, NC State and Florida State to face one another ahead of the championship game. The ACC’s expansion to 18 teams ahead of this season means three squads now miss the 15-team bracket, and those programs this season are SMU, Wake Forest and Miami.
As the No. 2 seed, Notre Dame will begin play at 5 p.m. on Friday against either No. 7 Cal, No. 10 Virginia or No. 15 Pittsburgh. The Irish have blown out all three, defeating the Golden Bears 91-52 on Feb. 9, the Cavaliers 95-54 on Dec. 29 and the Panthers 88-57 on Feb. 13. Interestingly, Cal has gone 2-0 against the two teams that beat the Irish in the regular season, but the Golden Bears don’t have a ranked win since defeating NC State on Jan. 9. They did, however, take down a spiraling Georgia Tech team that was ranked for most of the second half of the season last Thursday to win five of their last six games.
Despite their recent losses, the Irish still enter the ACC Tournament leading the conference in field goal percentage (49.2), opponent field goal percentage (35.9), 3-point percentage (40.3), rebounding margin (9.6), steals (11.3) and blocked shots (5.6). Hidalgo (24.2 points per game) and graduate guard Olivia Miles (16.5 per game) still each rank within the top 10 for scoring, with Hidalgo pacing the league in steals (3.8 per game) and Miles doing the same in assists (5.9). Graduate forward Liatu King ranks second in rebounding (10.9 boards per game).
Notre Dame will know its first opponent when Cal faces the winner of Virginia and Pitt’s Wednesday game at 5 p.m. on Thursday. Based on head-to-head results during the regular season, the Golden Bears are the favorite to take on the Irish. Should the Irish advance, they’d play in the second ACC semifinal at 2:30 p.m. on Saturday and the championship game at 1 p.m. on Sunday. Given their current position at No. 6 in the AP Poll and No. 4 in the NET rankings, Notre Dame may need another ACC crown to claim a coveted No. 1 seed for the NCAA Tournament.
Hockey
Notre Dame’s opponent for the best-of-three Big Ten quarterfinal is already set, as the Irish will face the Minnesota Golden Gophers in Minneapolis. The Irish enter the tournament with the No. 7 seed out of seven teams for the first time since joining the Big Ten in 2017, as they were swept on home ice by Michigan State last weekend to finish the regular season at 10-23-1 overall and 4-19-1 within league play. They’re hoping to become the second No. 7 seed in Big Ten Tournament history to upset a No. 2 seed after Ohio State shocked Wisconsin in Madison last year. In each of the other five opportunities, the No. 2 seed did not win a single game in the series.
Advancing will also require the Irish to win two out of three Big Ten road games, something they haven’t done all season. They went 1-3 against Minnesota in the regular season, losing 6-3 and 5-3 on home ice in November before splitting with the Gophers in their house in January. Though Minnesota ambushed the Irish with a five-goal first period on Friday night of that series, Notre Dame answered with a 4-3 overtime win on Saturday. Graduate winger Blake Biondi scored the game-winning goal after the Irish held on to the puck for nearly all of the overtime period’s first three minutes and 46 seconds.
Senior winger Justin Janicke, who was named the Irish captain ahead of the January series at Minnesota, enters the postseason on the hottest hot streak of his career. The native of Maple Grove, Minnesota, has a goal in five straight games – including a power-play goal in four straight – and is now one of eight Big Ten skaters with 15 goals and 33 points on the season. One of the other seven, sophomore Irish forward Cole Knuble ranks fourth in the conference with 37 points on 11 goals and a league-high 26 assists. Janicke and Biondi each rank within the Big Ten’s top six for power-play goals with 8 and 7, respectively. In net, junior Owen Say should get the Friday nod, as he ranks third in the Big Ten with 685 saves and sixth with a .913 save percentage. He was terrific at Minnesota in January, stopping all 22 shots he faced off the bench in game one before starting Saturday’s win, in which he made 30 saves.
Minnesota comes in ranked third in the nation after finishing the regular season at 24-8-4 overall and 15-6-3 within Big Ten play. The Golden Gophers earned a share of the Big Ten regular season title with Michigan State by beating Penn State on the road this past Saturday. The Golden Gophers are looking for their 17th conference tournament championship, which would be their second in the Big Ten after claiming the title in 2021.
A dominant team at home, Minnesota has lost just two games all season inside 3M Arena at Mariucci – one to conference No. 1 seed Michigan State and the other to Notre Dame. The Golden Gophers lead college hockey in scoring offense and put more than 35 shots on goal per game. Junior forwards Jimmy Snuggerud (45), Connor Kurth (36) and Matthew Wood (35) each rank top-10 in the Big Ten for points, with Snuggerud perhaps the best wrist shot in the country. Chicago Blackhawks first-rounders Oliver Moore and Sam Rinzel, a defenseman, have contributed a combined 57 points.
Despite their high ranking and offensive prowess, the Golden Gophers are beatable in a few areas. Most notably, their success rate of 75% on the penalty kill ranks inside the nation’s bottom 15, while the Irish power-play percentage of 23.8 occupies the top 15. Minnesota also struggles at the faceoff dot while Notre Dame typically performs well, a big reason for the Irish overtime win in January. Finally, top Gopher netminder Liam Souliere has been terrific statistically with a .922 save percentage and a 2.18 goals against average, but he’s still only a year removed from a dreadful Penn State year sitting at .874 and 3.38 in those two categories. Souliere also has a subpar record of 2-5-1 in his career against the Irish.
In this year’s tournament, Notre Dame will be looking for its first postseason title since 2019 and one more win for its head coach, Jeff Jackson. The 20-year Irish bench boss currently sits at 599 wins in his final season with one more chance to break the 600 mark. Notre Dame and Minnesota will drop the puck at 8 p.m. on Friday and Saturday and 7 p.m. on Sunday (if necessary).
