NC State Crumbles on the Road Against Notre Dame
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Wes Moore and NC State women's basketball needed a victory on the road over an equally inconsistent Notre Dame Fighting Irish to stay afloat in its battle for a top-three spot in the ACC standings, but the Wolfpack came up short. The Irish blitzed the Pack in the second quarter, ultimately winning 79-67 in South Bend, Indiana.
The Wolfpack did not get the balanced offensive performance it needed to keep pace against Notre Dame, which, as always, leaned heavily on talented guard Hannah Hidalgo, who scored a team-high 19 points in the win.
What went wrong for the Wolfpack?
Notre Dame accomplished a key goal in effectively eliminating the productivity of two key members of the Wolfpack from an offensive standpoint. Junior guard Zoe Brooks scored 33 points in the 2025 matchup against the Fighting Irish, but mustered just 11 points in South Bend on Sunday, shooting 3-of-10 from the field.
The Irish also completely took sophomore forward Tilda Trygger out of the game. The Swedish big scored just two points in the loss, attempting just three shots in 27 minutes for the Wolfpack. The struggles of Trygger and Brooks placed tremendous pressure on the Wolfpack's defense, as well as the other members of the starting five to pick up the slack.
Sophomore guard Zam Jones paced the Pack with 21 points, but missed seven of her eight attempts from beyond the 3-point arc. The game fell apart for NC State in the second quarter, as Notre Dame outscored the visiting Wolfpack 30-13 in that 10-minute stretch. Trailing by 20 when the halftime buzzer sounded, NC State's road to victory was just too difficult to march on.
NC State's best push came in the fourth quarter, when it outscored Notre Dame 25-14, but the lead the Fighting Irish built up in the opening three quarters was too large to overcome. The Fighting Irish got double-digit scoring outputs from three players other than Hidalgo, including Cassandre Prosper, who chipped in 14 points while shooting 50% from the field.
Where does the Wolfpack go from here?
It's been one step forward, two steps back for the Wolfpack all season long. Just when NC State appears to be making progress as a team, it collapses in a game like Sunday's. The challenges are significant throughout the rest of the season for Moore's group, but there is also still room to maneuver. The first step in recovering comes in the form of a massive road game against No. 11 Duke on Thursday.
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Tucker Sennett graduated summa cum laude with a B.A. in Sports Journalism from the esteemed Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University. A former basketball player, he has gained valuable experience working at Cronkite News and brings a deep passion for sports and reporting to his role as the NC State Wolfpack Beat Writer On SI.
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