Notre Dame basketball coach alludes to roster tampering, leaned on relationships

With the transfer portal and NIL being a bigger thing these days, there have been lots of comments from lots of different coaches about the possibility of tampering. Allegations that some coaches have gone after players still part of a roster like Notre Dame basketball's have flown fast as furiiously. 

For the most part, those kinds of allegations have been about other teams, but Notre Dame women's basketball coach Niele Ivey alluded to tampering allegations and her team earlier this week, alleging that all the talk that Hannah Hidalgo might be on the move this offseason had something to do with people talking to one of the ACC's best players.

In speaking to College Sports on XM Radio, Ivey alluded to "roster retention" and the work she did to keep Olivia Miles and Hidalgo on the same team. 

Notre Dame basketball dealt with some Hannah Hidalgo tampering

"Right after the season," Ivey said. "You never know, you never know the conversations. I just rely on my relationship. You got my relationship with the players, it's solid.They know my intent, they know my heart.

And so I kind of relied on that. And I was more, if she wanted a conversation with me,I had individual player development meetings, kind of talk about where I saw them,what areas that I needed them to work on. Those type of things. Just having that communication and transparency."

The Notre Dame basketball coach went on to say that in the end, Hannah Hidalgo is a "Notre Dame kid." That meant that when Ivey was talking to her about everything early this offseason, she had a bit of an ace in the hole.

However, that didn't mean that she didn't have to worry about what other teams were saying to her as well.

"But it's part of it, to be honest. It's definitely something that I feel, especially like you mentioned, with a high caliber player like that, I know it's part of it. And so it's just, you gotta get over those couple weeks."

"Those couple of weeks," are the weeks when the transfer portal is open. Ivey was apparently counting down to it close just like the rest of Notre Dame basketball community.