Notre Dame Pays Back Stanford for 2 Losses and Returns to Final Four

Jackie Young scored 25 points and grabbed 10 rebounds to lead the defending national champion, Notre Dame, back to the Final Four with an 84-68 victory over Stanford on Monday night in Chicago.

Notre Dame, the top seed in the Chicago Region, got some payback for tournament losses to the second-seeded Cardinal (31-5) in 2016 and 2017.

The Fighting Irish (34-3) are headed to the Final Four for the ninth time and will face Connecticut in Tampa, Fla., on Friday in a rematch of one of last year’s semifinals. They beat the Huskies and then Mississippi State on last-second shots by Arike Ogunbowale to claim their second N.C.A.A. title.

UConn and Notre Dame have played six times in the Final Four or national championship game since 2011. They have split the six meetings, with the Irish going 3-1 in the semifinals.

On Monday, Young scored 7 points in an 11-2 run to end the third quarter that gave Notre Dame a 6-point lead.

Ogunbowale finished with 21 points on 6-of-19 shooting, and the Irish pulled away in the second half for their 13th straight win after struggling to get their high-powered offense going.

Kiana Williams led Stanford with 20 points. Dijonai Carrington scored 18. Alanna Smith added 14 points and 8 rebounds. But instead of advancing to the Final Four for the 14th time, the Cardinal came up short after winning their previous 12 games.

First in the nation in scoring at 89.2 points per game, Notre Dame’s offense was listless until that 11-2 run late in the third.

A scoop layup by Young put Notre Dame on top, 45-44, with just over two minutes left in the quarter. She also drove for a layup in the closing minute to get the lead back up to 6 after Carrington made two free throws for Stanford.

Young added two baskets early in the fourth before Ogunbowale tracked down a loose ball and broke for a 3-point play, making it 59-48 with 7 minutes 47 seconds remaining.

The game was just the sixth between two storied programs that each have Hall of Fame coaches and two N.C.A.A. championships. But it was the fourth time in five years that they had met in the round of 16 or the round of 8.

Notre Dame beat the Cardinal in the regional semifinals in 2015, with Stanford returning the favor the following season. The Cardinal knocked out the Irish in the round of 8 in 2017, wiping out a 16-point deficit in the second half on the way to a 76-75 victory. Smith scored the go-ahead layup with 23 seconds remaining and Erica McCall swatted a last-second drive by Ogunbowale from behind to send Stanford to the Final Four.

After shooting a season-low 25 percent while outlasting Missouri State, 55-46, in the round of 16, Stanford was a little better in this one at just under 40 percent. But the Cardinal didn’t make enough baskets to keep the season going.

BAYLOR 85, IOWA 53 Maybe someone at the Final Four will actually give Baylor a game.

Four rounds into the N.C.A.A. tournament, and the Bears have barely faced any resistance.

Baylor cruised to its first Final Four in seven years with its latest bracket blowout, this one a rout of Iowa in a regional final in Greensboro, N.C.

“We’re getting up,” forward Lauren Cox said, “and we’re not letting people get back in the game.”

Cox had 22 points and 11 rebounds, Didi Richards added 16 points and 10 rebounds, and Chloe Jackson had 14 points.

The Bears (35-1), the No. 1 overall seed, won their 27th straight game by shooting 53 percent, clamping down on the all-American Megan Gustafson and her supporting cast, and holding the nation’s best shooting team to a season-worst 32 percent.

“We don’t know that we’re going to score this many points every night,” Baylor Coach Kim Mulkey said. “What we do know is, we’re going to defend you.” She added, “Nobody likes to be guarded for 40 minutes. It’s work. It’s hard.”

Their four tournament victories have come by an average of more than 38 points with none closer than 25. Now, it’s on to Tampa for the school’s fourth Final Four and its first since 2012, when the Bears won their second national championship. They will face Oregon on Friday in the national semifinals.

The 6-foot-4 Cox and her fellow twin tower, the 6-7 Kalani Brown, teamed up to dominate both the glass and the heavily hyped matchup with Gustafson, the nation’s leading scorer at 27.9 points per game.

Brown finished with 14 points, and Baylor held a 47-26 rebounding advantage with 20 second-chance points to 6 for Iowa. The Bears also outscored the Hawkeyes by 52-24 in the paint.

“Baylor was obviously too much for us today,” Coach Lisa Bluder said.

Gustafson finished with 23 points on 9-of-17 shooting but was held without a rebound in the second half for second-seeded Iowa (29-7). Kathleen Doyle and Tania Davis each had 10 points.

“We just tried to limit her touches,” Cox said. “She’s a good player. She’s going to get her points. We just couldn’t let that second or third player go off.”

The Bears — who entered allowing their opponents to shoot a Division I-worst 31.4 percent — held Iowa far below its previous worst of 41.1 percent at Purdue on Jan. 10.

The Hawkeyes hadn’t made it this far into the bracket since 1993 — when C. Vivian Stringer led them to their lone Final Four — but their worst shooting night of the year came at the worst possible time. That was, of course, mostly due to the Bears and their stingy defense.

“I’m not going to define our season by the last 40 minutes,” Bluder said. “I don’t think we played our best game. Did Baylor have something to do with it? Absolutely.”

Gustafson fell one rebound shy of setting an N.C.A.A. single-season record with her 34th double-double of the season. She will have to settle for sharing the record with two other players after she matched them with No. 33 in the round of 16. Baylor held her without an offensive rebound. “They had a little bit of a size advantage,” said the 6-3 Gustafson. “They were just throwing extra bodies at me.”