For the first time in seven years, women’s basketball teams UConn and Notre Dame will not play in the regular season.
Schools announced on Monday that the game was postponed because the Irish need to restructure their schedule due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The perennial and ex-rival powers of the conference extended their series last year until the 2023-24 season. That was delayed a year, with UConn hosting games next season and in 2023-24. The Irishman will host the games for the other two years.
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UConn coach Geno Auriemma said last week in a zoom call that he expected UConn to play all of its major games outside the conference that included Baylor, Notre Dame, South Carolina and Tennessee. None of these games have been officially confirmed yet, as the conferences are still trying to figure out their schedule.
Teams can only play 25 games of the regular season because of the coronavirus. Although most conferences have not yet released their schedules, ACC is expected to have a conference schedule of 20 games – 18 games.
UConn and Notre Dame have been the main rivalry in women’s basketball for the past decade. There was a period when the two teams were in the Big East and played 12 times in a three-year period from 2011-13.
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Both teams left the conference the following season and did not play until the national championship game, when both teams were undefeated. UConn won that game to end a 40-0 year. Including the postseason, the last time the teams did not meet in a season was in 1994-95.
UConn holds an all-time 38-13 lead in the series, including an 81-57 home win last December in the most recent encounter. It was the last time that Auriemma and Notre Dame coach Muffet McGraw would face each other on the court. McGraw stepped down as coach and was replaced by longtime assistant Niele Ivey in April.
