RALEIGH, N.C. – Laurin Mincy streaked toward the basket, the Notre Dame defense closing in quickly around her. She pulled up for a foul-line jumper that, to that point, had been all too easy for her this NCAA Tournament. Visions of an improbable comeback grew fainter every second.

Only the shot wasn’t there. Nothing was for the Terrapins women’s basketball team in PNC Arena last night.

A ferocious block from Fighting Irish forward Natalie Achonwa sent Mincy’s attempt careening off-course. Devereaux Peters saved the wayward ball and launched it to Skylar Diggins at midcourt. The Raleigh, N.C., Regional’s Most Outstanding Player, as was often the case, went in for an uncontested layup on the other end of the court. The top-seeded Fighting Irish’s lead was up to 24 points, and that was too much for even the No. 2 seed Terps, who’d made comebacks look customary.

They were playing with borrowed time by then in their eventual 80-49 loss. As Mincy’s shot became a Notre Dame basket, not even 10 minutes into the second half of the Elite Eight showdown, the game became a countdown to an inevitable end.

“I thought we looked really tired,” coach Brenda Frese said. “I felt like our energy and effort was spent in the game before [against Texas A&M].”

A 12-12 tie with 11:51 remaining in the first half marked the final time the Terps (31-5) would be in contention. The Fighting Irish (34-3) outscored their overmatched opponents 16-1 over the next six minutes and 28-9 to close the first half.

Led by Diggins’ first career triple-double (22 points, 11 assists, 10 rebounds), Notre Dame led the ACC Tournament champions by 19 entering halftime and by no fewer than 26 points during the final 10 minutes of the game.

“I thought we were a step slow all night. We did a lot more watching than we typically do,” Frese said. “Every time we went into timeouts, we weren’t gaining any ground.”

“We wanted to let them know why we were a No. 1 seed,” said Diggins, a first-team All-American. “We came out and we dominated.”

Achonwa’s (18 points) emphatic block came in the middle of a 16-4 run that gave the Fighting Irish their largest lead of the game at 32 points and led to the Terps’ largest defeat of the season.

Mincy followed her impressive 21-point, 12-rebound performance against the Aggies on Sunday with just two points on 1-for-6-shooting last night, a statline that seemed to signify all the high-flying Terps could not do with a Final Four berth on the line.

“I really couldn’t get into a rhythm,” Mincy said. “They did a great job of swiping at the ball when I did attack the rim, so I think that was all credit to them.”

Normally the dominant team on the glass – their 13.8 rebounding margin entering last night’s game ranked second in the nation – the Terps were routinely outmuscled by an undersized Notre Dame team. Though they feature three post players taller than the entire Fighting Irish team, the Terps totaled a season-low 27 boards in the game. Notre Dame had 46.

“They beat us at our own game tonight,” forward Alyssa Thomas (17 points) said. “They crashed the offensive boards and we weren’t boxing them out. Then on offense, for us, we didn’t get a chance to pull down rebounds because they boxed us out well.”

The Fighting Irish held the Terps to their lowest scoring output of the season by 10 points. They outshot them by nearly 10 percent from the field. They held them to 0-for-8 shooting from beyond the arc. Diggins alone finished with more assists (11) than the entire Terps team (10).

“I thought it was going to be a close game, back and forth,” Notre Dame coach Muffet McGraw said. “I thought we might get 10 points ahead. I did not envision this.”

Nor did Terps seniors Anjale Barrett, Kim Rodgers and Lynetta Kizer, whose careers ended in blowout fashion. The trio combined to score just 10 points.

“We had a phenomenal season. We had a lot of good wins this year, a lot of comeback wins,” Rodgers said. “We just weren’t able to get it done tonight.”

The Terps entered last night’s game with a chance to reach their first Final Four since their championship season in 2006. Just as Achonwa had to Mincy’s shot, the Fighting Irish did away with it convincingly.

“I thought they were spectacular,” Frese said. “Obviously, tonight was Notre Dame’s night.”

vitale@umdbk.com