OKLAHOMA CITY - Muffet McGraw has a national championship and more than 500 career wins to her credit.

She's a former national coach of the year and has at least one win over nearly every team she's faced in 21 seasons at Notre Dame.

But not Tennessee.

The one glaring line that she'd like to delete from her resume reads this way: 0-15 against the Lady Vols.

She'll get another chance Sunday night when the fifth-seeded Irish (25-8) face the defending national champions in the semifinals of the Oklahoma City Regional.

“I feel like it's sort of printed on my forehead '0-for-Tennessee,”' McGraw said Friday.

Pat Summitt's Tennessee squads have won by an average of 23 points.

Earlier this season, the Lady Vols won 87-63 at Notre Dame.

“They're an excellent team and probably the one year we had the national championship team, we didn't play them,” said McGraw, who led the Irish to the 2001 NCAA title.

“Not to say that we would have won, but probably that would have been our best chance.

“They've always been the higher seed when we've played them, and they're not the kind of team that looks past people, that you can sneak up on.”

Only two of the teams' 19 meetings have come in the NCAA tournament.

Tennessee beat the Irish 80-66 in the 1997 Final Four and then knocked off the defending champions in an 89-50 rout in the second round of the 2002 tournament.

Only one of the contests has been decided by single digits.

None of that matters to the Lady Vols (32-2).

“This is for a championship. You win or go home,” Tennessee forward Nicky Anosike said. “That's motivation right there.”

The Irish are seeking their first appearance in a regional final since their national championship run, while Tennessee is going for its seventh in a row and 13th in the past 14 years.

The Lady Vols have 10 Final Four appearances and four national titles in that stretch.

“They're the best team in the nation, and everybody wants to go out there and play against the best because it brings out the best in you,” said guard Charel Allen, who scored a career-high 35 points in Notre Dame's second-round win against Oklahoma.

“That's how I feel about playing against Tennessee.”

In their first meeting this season, Tennessee's Angie Bjorklund had a career-high seven 3-pointers as the Irish appeared to be concentrating their defense on All-American Candace Parker, although she still scored 20 points.

“I think the first time we played them, we worried too much about her, she still got 20 points and everybody else beat us as well,” McGraw said. “So I think we need a new plan.”

Of late, Allen said the Irish have watched film of the game “over and over again, and actually I'm tired of watching it.” McGraw said after the first game, she thought her team had “played scared.”

“I don't know if it helps playing them once, but I think it does help that we did play three of the No. 1 seeds and then Rutgers as a No. 2 seed. I think we got better during the year playing those kinds of teams,” McGraw said.

“I think at this point in the season, the seniors are thinking, 'We don't want our season to end,' so I don't know if we will be intimidated. I really don't think we will be, but certainly we're going to play hard.”

Tennessee counters with its own lineup of veterans seeking to go out on top.

Starters Alexis Hornbuckle, Shannon Bobbitt, Alberta Auguste and Anosike are all seniors, and Parker has already declared her plans to leave for the WNBA following her junior year.

“We talk about the legacy that this senior class could leave on this program,” Summitt said. “Yes, they've won SEC championships. Yes, they've obviously cut down the nets last year in Cleveland. But is there more for them to really leave their mark? I've tried to put that in front of them because I think they are such a talented team that they should be thinking we want to certainly let people know that we want to win a championship.

“We've won one. We would like to win two.”

As for McGraw's futility against Summitt, she provided this analysis of her chances this time against the 979-game winner.

“I think I'm getting Pat at good time right now. She's coming off the shoulder injury, she's got bad knees,” McGraw said. “I think if I get her in a running game this year, I've got her.”

To which Summitt said: “She's going to have to take those high heels off to catch me.”