Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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WOMEN'S BASKETBALL THE BIG THREE It might not be possible to award one team MVP honor this season. Among the trio of fifth-year senior guard Mad- ison Cable, sophomore post Brianna Turner and junior point guard Lindsay Allen, their value is enormous beyond stats. • The team has taken on the person- ality of the blue-collar, mentally tough, acutely instinctual and versatile Cable, who took command in the comeback wins at Duke (18 points, seven re- bounds and five steals) and Louisville (13 points, 12 rebounds and strong de- fense) — while battling tonsillitis that didn't even allow her to do interviews after the game. McGraw believes Cable, No. 3 nation- ally in three-point percentage (46.8, 52 of 111), is a bona fide ACC Player of the Year and All-America candidate just by the way she deflects attention from herself. "She hits big shot after big shot and is a great defender. She comes up with big plays; she is so clutch," McGraw praised. "We want to get her the ball in late-game situations." • The 6-3 Turner is Notre Dame's lone true inside force on offense and defense. She is tied with Cable for the team scor- ing lead (13.9 points per game), is tops in rebounds (6.8 per contest) and sixth nationally in blocked shots per game with 3.3. She has 60 blocks, while Cable is No. 2 with 10, but more significant is the numerous shots Turner alters with her presence. This is all that needs to be known about Turner's impact: in the six games she missed while recovering from a shoulder injury, the Irish opponents av- eraged 76.8 points per game and shot 45.8 percent from the field. In the 18 she played, the scoring average for Irish foes is 54.9 points per contest while shooting at a 34.0 percent clip. • Iron woman Allen's 101 consecutive starts are already a Notre Dame wom- en's basketball record. Part of why the Irish trailed late at both Duke and Lou- isville was she sat for extended spells because of foul trouble. Once reinserted, the Notre Dame engine purred again. Her 2.43 assist-to-turnover ratio leads the ACC, and she sacrifices her own scoring — 9.3 points per game when she probably could be in the 15.0 range — to be a facilitator for others. ✦ Sophomore center Brianna Turner has anchored the Irish defense, ranking sixth nationally with 3.3 blocks per game through Feb. 8. PHOTO BY JOE RAYMOND