Conventional wisdom said that Notre Dame would do well simply to get past No. 9 Maryland in Saturday’s first round of the BB&T Classic.
Conventional wisdom said that the unranked Irish would earn a moral victory simply by playing No. 2 Texas tough Sunday.
Conventional wisdom said that Notre Dame couldn’t possibly beat three Top 15 teams in a row.
Sunday at the MCI Center, the Irish turned conventional wisdom on its head, handing the Longhorns their first loss of the season.
With its 98-92 victory over Texas (5-1), Notre Dame improved its record to 8-1 and won the tournament title, capping one of the most memorable weeks in the program’s history. The week began with a victory over No. 13 Marquette at home. It ended with the Irish, one of the few unranked teams ever to beat three ranked teams in the same week, poised to jump back into the national polls.
“We’re in all-new territory now,” Notre Dame coach Mike Brey said. “We came into Washington on Friday off the radar screen. We’re going to be all over the radar screen starting [Monday].”
Though the matchup featured two of last season’s top freshman point guards–the Irish’s Chris Thomas and the Longhorns’ T.J. Ford–the difference may have been the play of a current rookie, Irish forward Torin Francis.
Francis not only led Notre Dame with 21 points and 10 rebounds, he also came up with eight blocks, three more than Texas managed as a team. And he neutralized Longhorns center James Thomas, holding him to just six points, eight below his season average.
Defense, though, was simply the side dish in a game that featured two of the most potent offenses in the country. Notre Dame went into the locker room at halftime leading 51-44.
“And I told our staff, we’re not going to stop them,” Brey said. “We’ve just got to put a lot of numbers on the board.”
The Irish managed that with a lethal combination of accuracy and toughness.
“Just because they did score 98 points doesn’t mean that we didn’t give it a good defensive effort,” Texas guard Sydmill Harris said. “It also means that they had a good offensive day.”
Indeed, just three minutes into the second half, the Irish had extended their lead to 61-49. But Texas outscored Notre Dame 16-4 in the next six minutes to tie the score at 65-65 with 11 minutes left in the contest.
“Every team is going to make a run,” said Ford, who sparked the Longhorns with a 21-point, 12-assist effort that, combined with his play Saturday against George Washington, earned him the tournament’s Most Valuable Player designation.
The Irish, though, answered. After ceding the lead to Texas for an eight-minute stretch, Notre Dame retook it 85-83 when, with two minutes to play, Miller rebounded Torrian Jones’ missed free-throw attempt and kicked the ball to Thomas, who made a three-pointer.
“That was a real momentum-builder for us,” said Miller, who finished with 20 points and was named to the all-tournament team along with Francis. Matt Carroll also scored 20 and Chris Thomas added 19.
“A lot was made of how physical Texas is, but we’re pretty physical too,” Brey said. “Everybody thinks we’re choirboys down there in South Bend. But we start Francis and [center Tom] Timmermans, that’s 255 [pounds] and 240, 6-10 and 6-11. So we have some beef we can throw in there too.”
Now the Irish simply have to learn to live with the success for which they have strived.
“One thing I talked to our guys about at the end was we need to learn how to handle success,” Brey said. “This is new territory for us.”
