Notre Dame freshman Emma Risch out for season with hip injury
Notre Dame women’s basketball can’t get free from the injury bug lately. The Fighting Irish lost another player for the season, head coach Niele Ivey said Wednesday. Freshman guard Emma Risch will have hip surgery soon.
“It was over time,” Ivey said of the injury. “It was something that happened even before she came on campus. Just kind of her anatomy. They needed to fix it. Something that got sore throughout the season and they went in and tried to do a couple things to eliminate the pain. It came back. It’s something that needed surgery and couldn’t wait until the end of the season.”
Risch played in seven games and averaged 4.6 points and 3.1 rebounds in 12.0 minutes. She hadn’t played since a 74-69 Notre Dame win at Tennessee on Nov. 29. Her best outing of the season came on Nov. 21 against Chicago State when she scored 16 points on 6-of-9 shooting. She made 4-of-6 three-point attempts.
If Notre Dame was completely healthy, losing Risch wouldn’t be too big of a blow. Her first season in Blue & Gold was supposed to be a developmental project to work on defense and get used to the college game. But with Olivia Miles having not made her season debut and Sonia Citron having been out for all but three games, Risch was another available body on a team that does not have enough of them.
Not anymore.
The Irish lost to Syracuse, 86-81, earlier this week. Ivey used a seven-player rotation. One of those players, graduate student center Becky Obinma, only played four minutes.
“For her, I mean, everyone is just trying to get better and staying ready,” Ivey said. “You never really know when your time is going to be called for multiple minutes or whatever it may be, so for her it’s just keep getting better, keep getting stronger and staying ready.”
Ivey did not provide a timeline for return for Miles, Citron, sophomore combo guard Cass Prosper or graduate student guard Jenna Brown. Prosper has had a boot on her right foot since she last appeared in a game on Nov. 24. She was averaging 5.8 points and 3.9 rebounds over five games. Brown has not played in any games this season despite being one of 13 scholarship players listed on the roster.
“It’s definitely difficult,” Ivey said. “It has been challenging. But my team has been resilient, and it’s next person up, unfortunately, with the numbers being kind of low. We’re trying to pivot, navigate and we’re doing everything we can to keep our team healthy and the ones that are potentially coming back, get them ready.”
