SPOKANE -- For the second year in a row, the road ended for the Oregon Ducks in the Elite Eight of the NCAA women's basketball tournament.

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Top-seeded Notre Dame beat No. 2 seed Oregon 84-74 in the Spokane Regional final on Monday night to advance to next weekend's Final Four in Columbus, Ohio.

The Ducks' loss came a year after they advanced to the Elite Eight as a No. 10 seed before losing to perennial power Connecticut. Notre Dame will face the Huskies on Friday at the Final Four, which will feature all four of the tournament's No. 1 seeds.

Ruthy Hebard's layup with 5:48 to play cut Notre Dame's lead to two, at 65-63, but that was as close as Oregon would get in the fourth quarter.

Sabrina Ionescu led Oregon with 26 points, but she struggled in the second half, shooting just 1 of 9 from the field. Hebard added 17 points and 10 rebounds for Oregon (33-5).

The Fighting Irish (33-3) took control of the game in the third quarter after the momentum had swung toward the Ducks in the second quarter.

Oregon led 46-40 at halftime after a breakneck first half that UO closed by shooting 62 percent in the second quarter.

The Ducks, who average 22 three-point attempts per game and are the nation's most accurate shooters from deep, couldn't find breathing room against Notre Dame's smother perimeter defense and didn't attempt a three until the first possession of the second quarter. Lexi Bando, the most accurate active shooter playing in Division I, was followed at all times by Jackie Young.

It was a swish, from freshman Satou Sabally, and gave her team a two-point lead. After a Ionescu jumper pushed the lead to four, UO didn't score for the next 100 seconds as Notre Dame ripped off a 9-0 run to lead 31-26.

With consecutive post buckets by Ruthy Hebard and pick-and-roll layups from Maite Cazorla, UO again took control and led by as many as nine after Lexi Bando's steal at midcourt and transition layup.

Oregon shot 59 percent in the first half, with Ionescu and Hebard combining to score 31 of their team's 46 first-half points. The Irish shot 49 percent through two quarters.

While UO opened the third quarter making two of its first eight shots, Notre Dame went on a blitz of a 7-0 run in just 62 seconds to take a 55-50 lead midway through the quarter. All-America guard Arike Ogunbowale scored the final bucket in the stretch after grabbing an offensive rebound, and the sequence was a microcosm of UO's third quarter struggles. The board was Notre Dame's 11th of the quarter -- while the Ducks had one.

But for every Irish advantage to that point -- and they were significant, with Notre Dame leading by 11 on the glass and seven on second-chance points -- Oregon pulled within 57-55 on Bando's wide-open corner three late in the third that brought life back to UO's bench. It was one of just three shots the Ducks made in the quarter while shooting 17.6 percent, and they trailed 61-55 entering the fourth.

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-- Andrew Greif

agreif@oregonian.com

@andrewgrief