Notre Dame built a roster filled with WNBA-level talent. Can it finish the job?
Niele Ivey had one job when she returned to her alma mater as an assistant coach in 2007. There was a skinny, baby-faced high school guard making national headlines out of South Bend, Indiana, and Notre Dame needed to keep her at home. Those pipe-cleaner arms would become sculpted over the years, and the recruit would grow into a three-time all-American, an Olympic gold medalist and six-time all-WNBA selection while becoming one of the most recognizable women’s basketball players on the planet.
“Her first job was to get Skylar Diggins[-Smith],” former Notre Dame coach and Hall of Famer Muffet McGraw said. “That’s your job. That’s your one recruit. Get her.”
Ivey delivered, and that was just the beginning. She would have a hand in bringing in future WNBA stars Jewell Loyd, Kayla McBride, Arike Ogunbowale, Marina Mabrey and Jackie Young, and the latter three would be key members of the 2017-18 team that won the Fighting Irish’s first national championship since Ivey’s playing days in 2001.
“The way she’s able to recruit, how she connects with the players,” Diggins-Smith said, “her background, being a champion in the NCAA and having WNBA experience, she knows how to develop players. You continue to see a lot of that development through today.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2025/03/21/notre-dame-womens-final-four-contender/