The Immaculata women’s basketball team will make its second appearance at Madison Square Garden – nearly 35 years after playing the first women’s game ever in the New York City arena.

The Mighty Macs will be the visiting opponent during the coming season for Cabrini’s annual game in the arena, and the occasion likely will stir memories of a 1975 victory over Queens by a team that included future coaches Marianne Stanley and Rene Portland among its players.

The game will be played January 23 as part of a tripleheader that also will include a men’s game between Villanova and St. John’s and a women’s game between St. John’s and South Florida

“We are excited and grateful for the opportunity to play at Madison Square Garden, not only because of its rich basketball history, but because of the significance of Immaculata’s return there and the impact the school made on women's basketball,” said Patty Canterino, Immaculata director of athletics and women’s basketball coach.

In its first game at the Garden, defending three-time Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women champion Immaculata beat Queens, 65-61, in front of 11,969 fans. The game was played February 22, 1975.

That team, which competed in skirts, would play the first nationally televised women’s game one month later against Maryland, en route to its fourth straight AIAW championship-game appearance, where the Mighty Macs lost to Delta State.

Now, Immaculata is a member of Division III’s Colonial States Athletic Conference. League foe Cabrini will be playing in the Garden for the third straight year, after beating Notre Dame (Maryland) there in 2008 and Neumann last season.

“For some of our players, this will be their second and third opportunities, but for others, it will be their first,” said first-year Cabrini head coach Kate Pearson. “Either way you look at it, it’s always an amazing moment for our student-athletes and this program.”