#2 Fighting Irish Top #9 Lady Vols, Diggins Scores Career-High 33 Points

Monday night was huge for the Notre Dame women’s basketball team.

Skylar Diggins, fresh off a record-setting game in which she scored her 2000th career point, put up a career-high single-game point total. The team beat the Lady Vols in Knoxville, Tenn. for the first time ever. And they made history by becoming the first NCAA women’s team to beat both Connecticut and Tennessee in three consecutive seasons, as well as becoming the first team to beat both of those teams on the road in the same season.

Jewell Loyd, Madison Cable, and Kayla McBride were the next three highest scorers with 10, nine, and nine points, respectively, en route to the Irish’s 77-67 victory that boosted Notre Dame to a 19-1 overall record, 7-0 in the BIG EAST.

Notre Dame sits second among a very interesting top four in women’s college basketball. Baylor (18-1) is first, followed by Notre Dame (19-1), Connecticut (18-1), and Stanford (18-2). While those teams are decidedly the top four, one could make an argument for almost any ordering.

Baylor’s only loss comes from Stanford, Notre Dame’s only loss comes from Baylor, Connecticut’s only loss comes from Notre Dame, and Stanford’s two losses come from Connecticut and #6 California (17-2).

All of that, however, only matters in determining the seeding for the quickly-approaching NCAA tournament in March. The remainder of Notre Dame’s schedule will be a chance for them to prove that they deserve a top seed with important BIG EAST matchups against #12 Louisville (17-4, 5-2), Syracuse (16-3, 4-2) and an inevitably intense rematch at home with #3 Connecticut (18-1, 5-1) in the final game of the season.

The Fighting Irish will take on Cincinnati (8-11, 0-6) this Saturday at 2 pm ET in the Purcell Pavilion. Watch it live on UND.com.