BLOOMINGTON — Indiana women's basketball forward Mackenzie Holmes climbed to the top of the mountain two steps at a time.

Holmes made a beeline for the student section at Assembly Hall after the Hoosiers put the finishing touches on a 75-68 win over Oklahoma on Monday night in the second round of the NCAA tournament.

She was out of breath for the first time all night, but her joyful scream still carried over the raucous student section that engulfed Holmes and her teammates.

"My last moments in Assembly Hall I wanted to spend with them," Holmes said.

It was the celebratory moment that eluded the Indiana women's team last year — the team suffered an upset loss to Miami in the second round — and fueled them throughout the season.

Holmes made sure history didn't repeat itself.

The All-American forward took over the game with Indiana facing a 64-60 deficit in the final minutes. She scored eight straight points late in the fourth quarter and got multiple defensive stops during that stretch. Holmes had 29 points (20 in the second half), six rebounds and four blocks, to make her final game at Assembly Hall one for the ages.

More: How sweet it is. No deja vu for IU women's basketball. Hoosiers dig deep to Sweet 16.

‘They couldn’t guard her’

It wasn’t until the fourth quarter when Indiana coach Teri Moren knew she had to make a change.

For three-plus quarters, she relied on the same game plan that helped IU finish the regular season with one of the top scoring offenses in the country. She kept calling plays to get her shooters — particularly Sara Scalia — open looks, but nothing was working.

Indiana was 3 of 16 from 3-point range, tying the mark for its fewest made 3-pointers all year. Scalia, who was just 1 of 5 from long distance, credited Oklahoma for the way it fought through screens all night long.

Once the Sooners went up 64-60 with 2:41 to go while Indiana was in the midst of a nearly three-minute scoring drought, Moren knew it was now or never.

“She's had many moments where she's had to take over early in her career here at Indiana,” Moren said, of Holmes. “We just had a hard time tonight just finding any rhythm offensively. We just decided we had to get the ball into her.”

Holmes dropped in an easy layup against single coverage to end IU’s dry spell. The next time down the court three Oklahoma defenders collapsed into the paint and sent her to the free throw line where she knocked down both shots.

More: Assembly Hall crowd gives IU women's basketball 'push to get to the finish line,' Sweet 16

She went to her left once again to give the Hoosiers a lead. The possessions all looked similar — Holmes got the ball at nearly the same spot on the court — because Moren called the same exact play call each time down the floor.

“The ghost screen,” Sydney Parrish said. “I just pass it into her and she passes back out and I pass it right back and she scored.”

"We just kept going, they couldn't guard her, why stop it?"

Moren said the coaching staff made one key adjustment that allowed Holmes to overcome some of her earlier shooting woes. Holmes, who came into the game with a 66.6 field goal percentage, was 4 of 11 in the first half.

“The only thing I wanted her to do was to try to catch it a little bit deeper because they were pushing her out a little bit,” Moren said. “Then we could get the angle that we wanted for her to be able to score a little bit easier.”

‘She refused to lose’

Lenny Holmes knew the look on his daughter’s face.

It brought him back to Mackenzie’s junior year at Gorham High School when the team was playing Edward Little in the state title game. In a hard-fought battle reminiscent of Monday night’s game, Holmes took over in the fourth quarter by scoring 16 straight points.

“She just went beast mode,” Lenny told The Herald-Times.

The anxiousness Lenny felt for three-plus quarters on Monday night — the same helpless feeling that plagued him during IU’s brief Big Ten tournament appearance — faded away when Mackenzie took over.

“I knew how bad she wanted to go out with a win,” Lenny said. “It was like she refused to lose."

Holmes' family gathered for a group photo after the stadium had cleared out — they made sure to get the final score in the picture — and Lenny still had a smile plastered on his face.

More: IU women's basketball rallies past Oklahoma, advances to third Sweet 16 in four years

It was a far cry from the image of him circulating on social media a few weeks ago that showed him with his head buried in his hands during the broadcast of IU's season-finale. The picture was taken after he watched Mackenzie limp off the floor during the fourth quarter.

On senior night, Mackenzie reaggravated the left knee injury she's been dealing with since her freshman year in high school. That same injury derailed IU’s postseason run last year, but it was just an afterthought on Monday night thanks thanks to two-plus weeks of rehab.

After the game, Mackenzie went out of her way to thank IU’s strength and conditioning staff.

“They did everything possible to get me back on the court feeling healthy,” Holmes said. “I felt like myself tonight down the stretch. I felt great, I felt strong. For them to help me get back on the court, I'm very, very blessed."

Lenny felt the same way.

“Everyone knows she puts her whole heart in this program, this university, to being a Hoosier,” he said. “To be rewarded on her last night her, it's special."

‘This is her court, this is her place’

Holmes’ teammates described her heroics with an air of inevitability. Like Mackenzie’s father, they have grown accustomed to her dominating opponents to become the program’s all-time winningest player.

"Mackenzie is a special individual,” Chloe Moore-McNeil said. “Nothing new and nothing surprising when she takes over in those situations."

Parrish, who questioned why Holmes didn't earn first-team All-American honors this year after IU's win over Fairfield, went a step further.

"She's one of the greatest players to ever put on an Indiana jersey,” Parrish said. “I expected nothing less from her tonight.”

Holmes’ former running mate Grace Berger had the same reaction.

"I literally don't even react,” Berger said, of Holmes taking over. “it's something I've come to expect, over and over. Not surprised."

Indiana players also credited Holmes along with Moore-McNeil for calming them down during Oklahoma's late run. She was vocal during timeouts to help the team maintain its poise with the season on the line.

The Hoosiers didn’t have a single turnover in the second half and made 11 of 12 free throws in the fourth quarter.

“We played for her in the fourth quarter,” Indiana guard Yarden Garzon said.

For Holmes, it was the storybook ending she worried at times over the last few weeks might not be possible. Her teammates didn’t have any doubts about how the game would end once Holmes took the court for the final time at Assembly Hall.

“This is her court, this is her place,” Parrish said. “She left a mark tonight."

Michael Niziolek is the Indiana beat reporter for The Bloomington Herald-Times. You can follow him on X @michaelniziolek and read all his coverage by clicking here.

This article originally appeared on The Herald-Times: Indiana women's Mackenzie Holmes goes 'beast mode' in NCAA tourney win