Notre Dame point guard Olivia Miles, who hasn't played since suffering a serious knee injury in February 2023, is set to return and form a formidable backcourt duo with Hannah Hidalgo.
"I just continually worked on: 'This is happening for you, not to you. This is happening for your career, for the better of your body,'" Miles said Tuesday during ACC Tipoff media days in Charlotte, North Carolina. "I feel like I was able to come back as a result stronger, both physically and mentally, and just more confident.
She added: "I mean, I feel better than I've ever felt."
The rehab wasn't easy. She felt the pangs of frustration building alongside the pain and soreness. Sometimes it came during the exercise she hated most: lying on the ground, wrapping an elastic band around her foot and pulling it over her shoulder to force her surgically repaired right knee to bend farther than it wanted.
"Just a lot of discomfort," Miles said. "It's also tough because you know you're not playing."
Miles, a 5-foot-10 floor leader with excellent passing vision, became the first men's or women's freshman to post a triple-double in the NCAA tournament in 2022. A year later, The Associated Press second-team All-American tore an ACL, crashing to the baseline in the regular-season finale after her right knee buckled on a drive at Louisville.
She missed the postseason and ultimately all of 2023-24.
"This injury is like a wave," Miles said. "I always compare it to that, because one day you're going to feel great and the next day you're going to come in sore and not being able to move. ... I'm trying to stay balanced.
"Yeah, there are days when I come in and I feel so good and I'm like, 'Yeah I'm back.' But then there are other days where I'm like, 'Maybe I still need a little bit more work.'"
Notre Dame coach Niele Ivey knows the process, as she tore both of her ACLs during her playing career with the Irish.
"When you come back from ACL injury, there's like like a two- or three-month gap that you're in the same spot," Ivey said. "You're actually physically improving. But you don't you know. ... You still feel like you're stuck in the same spot. I know she had a couple of those moments."
Hidalgo rose to stardom as a freshman in Miles' absence, averaging 22.6 points on the way to becoming a first-team AP All-American and leading the Irish to the ACC tournament title.
Now the two finally get to play together on the court.
"I guess that's the big question everyone always asks, is how it's going to work out," Hidalgo said. "I think the puzzle pieces go together perfectly. And I know Coach Ivey, she recruits puzzle pieces. She doesn't just recruit a whole bunch of different great players. We all fit together well."
Coach Ivey looks at the two as "interchangeable guards" who have the ability to help each other: Miles to take some scoring weight off Hidalgo; Hidalgo to help Miles build back to elite form.
The road for the Irish this season will include pushing through a demanding ACC race that features NC State, which reached the Final Four, perennial power Stanford and NCAA tournament teams Louisville, Virginia Tech, Duke and North Carolina.