SOUTH BEND - At one point in the first half, Notre Dame freshman sensation Skylar Diggins left the Purcell Pavilion court during a timeout.

She sprinted up the tunnel and bolted into the Fighting Irish locker room to get a pair of replacement uniform shorts because a string broke in the pair she was wearing.

That’s about the only time Pittsburgh got a break from the South Bend southpaw.

Diggins scored a career-high 23 points, hauled down a career-high 10 rebounds, and tied a career best with six assists to lead No. 3 Notre Dame to an 86-76 victory over Pitt Saturday in women’s basketball action. A sellout crowd of 9,149 attended the Big East matchup.

Coach Muffet McGraw’s Fighting Irish boast a 21-1 record overall and an 8-1 mark in Big East play. The Irish play next at Cincinnati on Tuesday. Tip-off is scheduled for 7 p.m. EST.

Pitt falls to 12-10 overall and 1-8 in the Big East. Notre Dame leads the series with Pitt, 18-3, but the Panthers entered Saturday’s game having won three of the previous four meetings.

Diggins pounced on the Panthers for 17 points in the first half and tied her career highs in points (21), rebounds (8) and assists (6) by the 9:06 mark of the second half.

Lindsay Schrader scored 18 points for Notre Dame and Becca Bruszewski contributed 10 points to the Irish attack.

Taneisha Harrison led Pitt with 20 points.

“Well, it looks like a guard with a double-double, and it wasn’t Lindsay Schrader,” McGraw joked in a reference to Schrader, a senior who owns the school-record for double-doubles by a guard (16).

“That’s an incredible stat line,” McGraw said of Diggins. “Twenty-three points, 10 rebounds, six assists, but the big number is zero - zero turnovers. That was huge. It was just a fantastic game, start to finish. It was really impressive.”

The 5-foot-9 Diggins swatted away two Pittsburgh shots. She connected on 6-of-13 field-goal attempts, including 2-of-4 from 3-point range. Diggins swished nine of 11 free throws.

“I was getting open looks running the plays, coming off of screens,” Diggins said. “My teammates did a good job of setting me up. Points in transition, that’s our game. And we wanted to make sure we came out aggressive.

“Coach really emphasized coming out and doing that and getting them in foul trouble. I just wanted to be a spark and get us off to a good start in the first half.”

Diggins sparked a 14-2 Irish run in the first half with a 3. The Panthers would never get closer than five the rest of the game.

Notre Dame attacked the taller and physical Panthers inside. The Irish outscored Pitt 46-34 in the paint, and outrebounded the Panthers 38-32.

“That’s pretty hard to believe, with the size that they have,” McGraw said of Notre Dame’s success inside. “That’s pretty impressive. We really did a nice job of attacking the basket off the dribble.

“I thought Natalie had some nice moves inside. Skylar got in the lane a little bit, but Schrader was unstoppable down low.”

McGraw was pleased with Schrader’s effort off the blocks. The 6-foot senior muscled inside to hit seven of 11 shots, and added four of six free throws to her total.

“I thought Schrader has a great game,” McGraw said. “You could tell from the beginning of the game, she came out ready. We wanted to go into her as much as we could.”

Schrader said that being physical was a point of emphasis for Notre Dame.

“I just remember on the jump ball, that girl was right next to me, and I had to look up, up to her (Pepper Wilson, who is 6-foot-6),” Schrader said. “And I thought, ‘This is going to be a long game.’

“I think we just had to go around them,” Schrader said of Notre Dame’s success in the paint. “A few of us got our shots blocked (when) we tried to go over them. You can’t do that with a 6-6 girls. You have to go around them. Once we started going around them, they started fouling us. That’s how we got to the foul line.”

Notre Dame hit 21 of 29 free throws, compared to nine of 15 by Pitt.

Pitt coach Angus Berenato wasn’t happy about the 21 fouls whistled on the Panthers compared to 12 called against Notre Dame. But Berenato was happy to see her injury-riddled team have four players in double-figure scoring and continue to improve.

“We are getting it together,” Berenato said. “Now, I don’t know if we are going to get it together and keep it together in time to make a difference with this season, but the most important thing for me as an educator is that every day, we get better, and every day we enjoy the game and we respect the game and we get better. I feel like today, my team and my staff, I feel like we got better. I’m proud of my team.”