12/8/2024
On Saturday, Notre Dame halted its five game losing streak with a 69-64 home win over Syracuse in the ACC opener for both teams. Each team has had a bumpy path to get to conference play and both the Irish and the Orange are without their respective leading scorers, Markus Burton and J. J. Starling.. The game featured many lead changes and a second half where no team led by more than three until the two minute mark. What the game did not feature was skillful Syracuse long range shooting. They were held without a three-point field goal for the first time in over ten years. In fact, they only attempted nine triples in total (later that night, the Boston Celtics would attempt 60 of them, but I digress).
Syracuse guard, Elijah Moore, said after the game, “Mentally, we were so focused on getting the ball inside that we didn’t realize that we weren’t taking any shots.” Now that is the situational court awareness every coach is looking for. Or not …
11/30/24
Tough week for the Irish. Not even four minutes into Notre Dame’s 85-84 OT loss to Rutgers on Tuesday, Markus Burton went down with a knee injury. In related news, the team then lost their next two games; Thursday to Houston, 65-54, and Saturday to Creighton, 80-76. All three losses were part of the inaugural Players Era Festival in Paradise, NV.
Paradise is an unincorporated town adjacent to the City of Las Vegas. And, no, what happens in Paradise does not stay in Paradise. Those three losses “count” and put ND level on the year, 4-4. And the injury to Burton is likely to keep him out for several weeks.
Ugh.
11/24/2024
Notre Dame had a pair of home games this past week starting Tuesday with a comfortable win over another ND, North Dakota, 75-58. However, Friday brought the first loss of the season for the Irish as Elon came in to Purcell Pavilion and emerged with an 85-77 win. It was a bad loss - the kind that can come back to haunt them if they are in the tournament mix at the end of the season.
Elon is coached by former (1991-1995) Irish player, Billy Taylor. Taylor is an interesting story in that he walked away from an accounting career in his twenties to pursue his dream of coaching college basketball. Hey. Cool. That means he and I actually have very similar LinkedIn profiles; Notre Dame grad, worked at Arthur Andersen, became a CPA … then found our way to big time college basketball. Him coaching the D1 Phoenix to big wins and me writing snarky hoop blurbs for whatever this site is.
Same same.
11/17/2024
The Irish had a very productive week with wins on Monday night at home over Buffalo, 86-77, and on the road at Georgetown on Saturday afternoon, 84-63. The win over the Hoyas avenged a painful overtime loss last year in South Bend. Also, this past Tuesday was the beginning of the early commitment period for recruits. Notre Dame garnered four National Letters of Intent, er, Athletic Aid Agreements resulting in their best mens basketball haul in the modern era.
Jalen Haralson, a five-star player from within Indiana, was the marquee signing. During an interview following his verbal commitment in October, Jalen said, among other things, “I really don’t know much about Notre Dame.” As a proud alum of the school, I have mixed feelings about the apparent new recruiting strategy of keeping prospects ill informed about the university.
But, alas, whatever works ...
11/9/2024
I will spare you a lengthy season preview for the 2024/2025 ND men’s basketball team. All you need to know is that the backcourt is solid, help is on the way next year with a great recruiting class, and any realistic goal for this season tops out at an NIT bid. Actually the bar for success is low - like super low. Last year the Irish had 20 losses for the second straight year, a first in the program’s history. So they really just need to lose 19 (or less). Put another way; they only need to win 12 games (or more).
Wednesday night they took a step in the right direction taking down fellow Congregation of Holy Cross school, Stonehill College, 89-60 in South Bend.
One win down. Eleven to go.
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