“I’m getting tired of the novelty of the first female governor of this state, the first female African-American mayor of this city. When is it going to become the norm instead of the exception?” she said, adding: “We don’t have enough female role models. We don’t have enough visible women leaders. We don’t have enough women in power.”

And as she spoke of young women coming-of-age, she described the world they were coming into. “Men run the world. Men have the power. Men make the decisions. It’s always the man that is the stronger one,” McGraw said, her voice rising.

If McGraw had long felt that way, seeing how many fewer career opportunities there are for women than men in college athletics, that speech seemed to have awakened something in her. Or at least the reaction did. She heard from women in a broad variety of professions, as well as from many men with young daughters.

“I was a little amazed that my speech just kept on going,” McGraw said Wednesday in a news conference held through videoconferencing because of the coronavirus pandemic. “I don’t really know where it started from, but it was something that I think I needed to get out, and I was really happy with the response across the country.”

It was shortly after, when Notre Dame lost its bid for back-to-back championships with a defeat in the N.C.A.A. final, that McGraw began to consider stepping away from the game. She decided to stay because she knew that, with five of her players exiting for the W.N.B.A., the 2019-20 season would be grim. Indeed, the Fighting Irish were 13-18 and would have seen their 24-year N.C.A.A. tournament-qualifying streak come to an end had the event not been canceled. But with a strong recruiting class for next season, she felt much better about stepping away now, she said.