ALBANY, N.Y. — Notre Dame guard Hannah Hidalgo was a rising prep star growing up in New Jersey, but she did not start following women’s basketball until her junior year in high school.
Now, in the middle of a freshman All-America season, Hidalgo reflected how she has become a household name headed into the Irish’s Sweet 16 matchup against Oregon State on Friday.
“I never thought I would be the face of something,” Hidalgo said Thursday. “It’s still like, ‘Wow, people are trying to look up to me.’ When I was in Spain, and people are chanting my last name, it’s just like, people know me from all over and it’s humbling. I continue to be humbled because I know in an instant everything could be taken away from me.”
Hidalgo has led an injury-depleted Notre Dame team, playing with six players in its rotation, to its third straight Sweet 16 appearance. It was the work of coach Niele Ivey, a Notre Dame alum herself, that got Hidalgo interested in playing for the Irish.
But during a wide-ranging interview Thursday during the open locker room period, Hidalgo said she did not know much about Notre Dame women’s basketball’s rich…
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