Panthers To Take On Notre Dame On ACC Network On Sunday Afternoon

PITTSBURGH – The Pitt women's basketball team will look to get back on track on Sunday afternoon as they head to South Bend, IN to take on the Notre Dame Fighting Irish. Sunday's game will air on ACC Network at 4:00 pm with Brett Dolan (play-by-play) and Monica McNutt (analyst) on the call.

HOW TO FOLLOW

Sunday afternoon's game against Notre Dame will air live on ACC Network or can be streamed by clicking HERE.
Fans can also listen to the game on the radio by tuning into 1320 AM WJAS. The voice of the Pitt women's basketball team, Josh Rowntree, will get you started with the pregame show at 3:45 pm followed by the call of the game at 4:00 pm. Listen to the call HERE.
Live stats for the game can be found by clicking HERE.
Live updates throughout the game will also be posted on Twitter by following the Pitt women's basketball account @Pitt_WBB.

THE SERIES

This meeting marks the 32^nd of all-time between the two programs with Notre Dame owning the 28-3 lead in the series.
The Fighting Irish have won 11 straight in the series and own a 13-0 record in games in South Bend.
The Panthers last win in the series came on Feb. 3, 2009 when they downed the Fighting Irish 82-70 at the Pete.

SCOUTING THE FIGHTING IRISH

The Notre Dame Fighting Irish enter Sunday's game with a 9-14 overall record and a 4-7 ACC mark. The Irish are on a two-game winning streak.
The Irish are being led offensively by senior Destinee Walker who is averaging 13.9 points, 4.1 rebounds and 1.4 steals while Katlyn Gilbert is averaging 13.8 points, 4.3 boards and a team-high 2.0 steals.
Freshman Sam Brunelle is enjoying a great rookie campaign as she is leading all ACC freshman averaging 13.7 points and 6.1 rebounds while connecting on a team-high 35 three-pointers.
As a team, the Irish are averaging 64.3 points while allowing 69.3 points/game on average. The offense is shooting 39.9% from the floor overall but just 23.8% from behind the arc.
Notre Dame is the worst rebounding team in the ACC this season as they hold a -7.0 rebound margin (37.0 - 44.0) on the year.

LAST TIME OUT

After a strong first quarter that saw the Panthers only trailing by three, the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets pulled away in the second half to hand Pitt the 77-48 defeat.
Pitt was led in scoring by Gabbie Green and Rita Igbokwe who each netted 10 points in the loss.
As a team, Pitt was outrebounded 43-26 overall and 20-9 on the offensive glass. The Yellow Jackets also turned 23 Pitt turnovers into 24 points in the defeat.

NEWCOMERS CONTINUE STRONG PLAY

Entering the 2019-20 campaign, the Panthers knew they were going to have to rely heavily on a handful of newcomers to make an impact and they have done a nice job so far this season.
The six newcomers for the Pitt are averaging a combined 40.0 points and 27.0 rebounds per game so far this season.
The newcomers are accounting for 68.8% of the Panthers scoring efforts this season and 65.9% of the rebounding efforts.
The freshman duo of Dayshanette Harris and Amber Brown have combined to score 19.0 points per game, the second best freshman duo in the ACC behind Notre Dame's duo of Sam Brunelle and Anaya Peoples (26.3 ppg).
The freshman duo of Brown and Rita Igbokwe are currently lead all ACC freshman duos in combined rebounds (15.0 rpg). The duo is currently ranks third in the NCAA for freshman duos combined rebounds/game, trailing only a duos from UC Santa Barbara (15.9 rpg) and Oregon State (15.5 rpg).
Brown and Igbokwe are one of two duos of freshman teammates in the NCAA averaging at least 6.8 rpg each (Oregon State).
Pitt and Virginia are the only teams in the ACC with three freshman (Harris, Brown, Hayford) who are averaging at least 20.0 mpg on the season.

IGBOKWE MOVING UP THE BLOCK CHARTS

Freshman Rita Igbokwe has continued to grow as a player and shot blocker through her 22 career games for the Panthers.
After a five-block performance against Florida State, Igbokwe now has a total of 44 blocks on the season, second most in the ACC.
Igbokwe's season total of 44 blocks currently sits in a tie for third place on the Panthers all-time charts for blocks in a single season by a freshman.
With at least eight games left, Igbokwe is 11 blocks away from setting the program freshman record for blocks in a season.
So far this season, Igbokwe has 12 multi-block games and five games with four or more rejections.

SINGLE SEASON BLOCKS BY A FRESHMAN
#     Name                      Season       Blk's
1.    Wanda Randolph 1976-77       54
2.    Stasha Carey          2014-15       47
3.    Rita Igbokwe         2019-20       44
Pepper Wilson 2008-09       44
5.    Chelsea Cole          2007-08       38
6.    Brenna Wise 2015-16       32
Latia Howard 1994-95       32

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