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Coach Muffet McGraw and Notre Dame take on Stanford on Friday night in the Sweet 16.

OKLAHOMA CITY — The Notre Dame women’s basketball team arrived several hours late in advance of its Sweet 16 game as it tried to avoid storms and tornadoes in the Oklahoma City area that left one person dead on Wednesday.

Notre Dame’s traveling party considered flying into Dallas and possibly spending the night there, but instead landed in Lawton, Oklahoma, about 100 miles southwest of Oklahoma City.

“When we first landed in Lawton, we really didn’t know what was up at first,” guard Lindsay Allen said. “And we get off the plane, and it’s like, really, really windy.”

The team bonded in the terminal, eating pizza, watching Netflix and playing cards, while waiting for buses to arrive from Oklahoma City.

“We were just hanging, you know, we were being kids,” guard Jewell Loyd said. “Everyone is laughing, dancing. We had food delivered to the airport, and we were just watching the storm as it continued to rain — just the colors of the clouds and stuff like that — and we were kind of just relaxing.”

Notre Dame associate media relations director Chris Masters said the team reached its hotel in Oklahoma City at about 11:15 p.m. Central time Wednesday, about three hours later than expected. The team practiced as scheduled Thursday to prepare for its game against Stanford on Friday night.

“We made the most of it, and our condolences to the people that were seriously affected by the storm,” Notre Dame coach Muffet McGraw said.

Stanford, which will play Notre Dame, landed before the worst of the weather.

“It was really quite a storm with hail on the bus, and we were getting warnings on our phones,” Stanford coach Tara VanDerveer said. “We were thankful to get to the hotel.”

Baylor-Iowa

Baylor also was affected ahead of Friday’s game against Iowa. Coach Kim Mulkey said the Lady Bears returned to their Waco terminal to refuel after waiting on the runway for a time before being told the Oklahoma City airport had been shut down because of bad weather.

Mulkey said the Lady Bears were able to wait inside the airport until the weather eventually cleared at their destination, arriving at their Oklahoma City hotel around 10 p.m.

Baylor, led by Big 12 Conference Player of the Year Nina Davis, advanced to its seventh straight Sweet 16 with wins over Northwestern State and Arkansas last weekend.

The Lady Bears face an experienced Iowa team. The program is making its eighth straight NCAA Tournament appearance — albeit its first Sweet 16 berth since 1996.

FSU-Arizona St.

For years, Florida State and Arizona State have been fighting their way up the ladder in women’s basketball.

One is about to move a step closer to its first Final Four.

The second-seeded Seminoles (31-4) face the third-seeded Sun Devils (29-5) on Friday night in a Greensboro Region semifinal.

Neither program has many extended NCAA Tournament stays to its credit: Florida State is in the Sweet 16 for just the third time while this is the Sun Devils’ sixth appearance in the regional semifinals.

The teams have combined for three Elite Eight appearances — Arizona State in 2007 and ‘09, and Florida State in 2010.

“A little different in style,” Arizona State coach Charli Turner Thorne said Thursday. “But very similar in the results.”

South Carolina-UNC

Top-seeded South Carolina earned a conveniently short trip for its NCAA Tournament Sweet 16 appearance.

Its opponent — fourth-seeded North Carolina, the lowest seed left in the region — got an even shorter one.

The Gamecocks (32-2) and Tar Heels (26-8) meet in the tournament for the second straight year in a Greensboro Region semifinal Friday night.

South Carolina coach Dawn Staley said Thursday that “we’re fortunate we only had to take a bus ride” and that even though they are essentially playing and “on someone else’s home court, I think our fans could make us feel very much at home.”

The Gamecocks earned their second straight top seed after winning their first Southeastern Conference tournament.

North Carolina coach Sylvia Hatchell says “I don’t see any weaknesses” in South Carolina.