Show Caption1 of 11Expand PRINCETON — The Colonial Valley Conference Colonial Division varsity girls’ basketball race took a turn Tuesday night. Princeton High, which had not lost a CVC contest in 2024-25, met its match when Notre Dame visited Tuesday and handed the Tigers a 52-43 setback The loss stopped 8-3 Princeton’s four-game winning streak, while also halting the 5-5 Irish’s five-game losing streak. But 5-foot-8 junior guard Caroline Foley said she saw the change coming before last night’s turnaround. “Our third quarter against Thrive Charter (in a 63-51 loss Sunday as part of the Coaches Choice Challenge at St. Thomas Aquinas) was the best we’ve played this season,” Foley said. “It carried over into this game. This was a big win for us.” Head coach Beth Fitzpatrick’s troops outscored the Titans, 18-6, in that telling stanza to turn a game they were losing, 40-19 at halftime, into a much closer, 46-37, at the start of the fourth quarter. After that, it was just a matter of sustaining the confident play, like ND had back when it started the season with four consecutive wins. Foley, who scored 12 points to make her one of three Irish in double figures, extended praise to 5-6 senior guard Alayna Ramirez for their team’s high level of play Tuesday. “Alayna kept us in that game,” Foley said. “We won because of her.” All the backcourt veteran did was hit a 3-point field goal (her first of the season) to put the visitors up 35 seconds into what would become a back-and-forth affair throughout. When the game, which featured 13 lead changes and three ties through three quarters, entered its final eight minutes, Ramirez went on to score Notre Dame’s first eight points of the fourth quarter to stretch a 40-38 edge to 48-43 with 3:32 to play. She would finish with a game-high 17 points, 12 of which came in the second half. “My role has not really changed,” said Foley, who added six rebounds and five steals. “I want to be more than just a 3-point shooter. So I’m trying to do a little bit of everything and show that I’m a little more well-rounded.” Foley did that by hitting four consecutive foul shots in the final minute to secure the game. Along with 14 points, including four 3-pointers, from 5-4 senior guard Meg Connolly, the Irish handed head coach Joe Smiegocki’s Tigers their first Colonial Division loss this year. “We were really in our own heads,” Princeton 5-9 junior forward Katie Sharkey said. “In the second half, we weren’t being as positive as we needed to be.” Sharkey led the home team with four treys and 16 points, all scored over the first three quarters. Five-foot-eight junior forward Anna Winters added 12 points. But after Winters scored off a steal with 4:04 left in the final stanza to close the gap to 44-43, the Tigers did not score again. Instead, Ramirez scored twice in a 32-second span to stretch the lead back to five points and keep the game from taking any more turns. NOTRE DAME (52) Diaz 0-0-0, Ramirez 7-2-17, Connolly 5-0-14, Borrero 1-0-2, Foley 3-4-12, Bucchere 2-0-4, Hughes 0-0-0, Kniffin 1-0-3. Totals — 19-6-52. PRINCETON (43) Grippo 0-0-0, Winters 5-2-12, Sharkey 6-0-16, Romain 2-0-4, QGallagher 0-0-0, Bornstein 2-0-5, Hunt 3-0-6, Cao 0-0-0. Totals — 18-2-43. Notre Dame (5-5)                   18    11    11    12    —    52 Princeton (8-3)                       14    10    14      5    —    43 3-point goals — Ramirez, Connolly 4, Foley2, Kniffin (ND), Sharkey 4, Bornstein (P).