Jewell Loyd talks to the media following Notre Dame’s win over Montana Friday night. (Leader photo/AMELIO RODRIGUEZ)

NOTRE DAME — If Notre Dame is going to reach the Final Four for a fifth straight year, junior Jewell Loyd will be the reason.

The silky smooth guard from Lincolnwood, Illinois, is a finalist for the national player of the year.

Loyd helped Notre Dame with the Atlantic Coast Conference regular season and tournament championships and she propelled the Fighting Irish into Sunday night’s second round of the NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament.

Loyd scored 18 points in 9-of-14 shooting to co along with four assists and three rebounds in just 26 minutes of playing time against Montana Friday night.

Notre Dame, the No. 1 seed in the Oklahoma City Regional, defeated the Lady Griz 77-43 to advance to the second round where it defeated DePaul 79-67 Sunday night.

For Loyd, it was her 33rd double-digit game of the season and the 94th of her career. She now has 694 points this season, which passes her output for the 2013-14 year.

Loyd is now third on the all-time single season scoring list for the Fighting Irish.

Despite being the main focus of all of Notre Dame’s opponents, Loyd has been able to carry the load for the Fighting Irish.

“She was fortunate to have some great mentors ahead of her and she really learned a lot from them in every facet of the game,” Notre Dame coach Muffet McGraw said. “She was able to come in as a freshman and just simply play. She didn’t have to lead, she didn’t have to do all the scoring, and she had no burden of carrying the team. She was just another great player on our team. Each year with graduation losses her role got a little bit bigger, but this year she has the biggest role of all. Now she is the feature.

“Last year the defense would have to decide, do you want to put your best defender on Kayla McBride or are you going to put her on Jewell? The year before that she was drawing the third-worst defender on a team with Skylar [Diggins] and Kayla McBride. Now she is getting the most attention and she is thriving. She has played the best basketball of her career this year with all the attention on her, all the focus of the defense on her and she still manages to average 20 points a game, so I think much more impressive is what she is doing this year than what she has done in the past. You can see she had the potential in the past to be somebody that could get 20 points a game if we wanted to get her that many shots but we always went with the team concept and we are still are doing that now but she is just so efficient with the ball. I am really impressed with her season this far.”

Loyd and the Fighting Irish still have plenty of obstacles to clear if they want to reach the Final Four in Tampa Bay, Florida.

There was the second round match-up against DePaul, which played Notre Dame tough during the regular season, and a potential game against No. 4 seed Stanford, the only team to beat No. 1 overall seed Connecticut this year.

The Cardinal still had to beat No. 5 seed Oklahoma on Sunday to advance to the regional semifinal Friday.