Advertisement

ND MEN'S BASKETBALL: Irish drop ACC opener to Syracuse

austin hough, goshen news, ind.
·4 min read

Dec. 3—SOUTH BEND — After a dominant win over No. 20 Michigan State Wednesday, Notre Dame laid an egg in its ACC opener Saturday against Syracuse.

Orange freshman Judah Mintz made a layup on the baseline with 14 seconds left, and then Syracuse's defense forced an off-balanced shot from Notre Dame's Dane Goodwin on the final possession to allow the visitors to leave Purcell Pavilion with a 62-61 win.

"Give Syracuse credit for making some big offensive plays there at the end," Notre Dame coach Mike Brey said. "We gave ourselves a chance. ... We needed to get that one stop that we didn't. Mintz had a heck of a baseline drive."

Mintz's shot was preceded by an old-fashioned three-point play from Fighting Irish guard Marcus Hammond. After missing the first seven games of the season due to a knee injury, the graduate senior played 17 minutes Saturday, scoring six points — including the three that put his team ahead, 61-60, with 29 seconds left in the game.

"We throw him into the fire and I thought he was fabulous," said Brey of Hammond. "He's in making plays. He makes the play to give us the lead, steps up and makes the free throw. And for me, it was kind of new territory because I had two subs always. He and (Ven-Allen Lubin) off the bench are fabulous. We've got a chance to get (Hammond) in shape now with some practice reps. ... He's not afraid. I love him."

Where Notre Dame (6-2, 0-1 ACC) struggled the most Saturday was shooting the ball. The Irish were bothered by the Orange's 2-3 zone throughout the game, finishing 23-of-60 (38.3%) shooting from the field. That percentage was 32% in the second half, including an abysmal 3-of-15 from beyond the arc in the final 20 minutes.

"We made eight in the first half — you're going to have to make five or six more," said Brey of the three-point shooting of his team. "You've got to be at 12 '3's' against that zone. ... I don't know if we even had good looks. We couldn't get into the lane to kick it. We couldn't get to the foul line."

Meanwhile, Syracuse (4-4, 1-0 ACC) was taking advantage of Notre Dame's lack of height on the offensive end. Jesse Edwards, a 6'11" senior, torched the Irish inside for the majority of the game. Edwards finished with 22 points and 14 rebounds on 10-of-15 shooting. He had 16 of those points in the first half.

Also aiding Edwards on the offensive end was senior Joseph Girard. The Orange guard scored 10 points in each half to give him 20 for the game. His layup with 2:28 remaining in the game gave the visitors its largest lead of the contest, 60-55.

For the Irish, Goodwin started the game strong, scoring eight of his team's first 10 points. He wound up finishing with a team-high 16 points in the game.

Notre Dame's largest lead was five on two separate occasions in the first half. After Syracuse led 4-2 early, the Orange did not gain the advantage again until they went up 28-27 on a '3' from Justin Taylor with seven minutes to go in the first half.

The game featured 12 lead changes and 12 ties, including 35-35 at halftime.

Goodwin, along with fellow graduate seniors Cormac Ryan and Nate Laszewski, struggled in the second half. The trio attempted two combined '3's' in the final 20 minutes after coming into the game as the team's top three shooters from beyond the arc.

"Syracuse made some changes in the second half," Goodwin said. "I really thought we couldn't get (the ball) into the middle. We just passed it around up top, got low on the (shot) clock and just weren't sure what to do. It's just a matter of working through it and figuring it out as you go. Credit to them: they made some changes and we couldn't figure it out."

Ryan finished with 14 points, while Laszewski only had two on 1-of-6 shooting. Freshman Ven-Allen Lubin added 10 points off the bench for the Irish, while freshman JJ Starling had seven and graduate senior Trey Wertz six to round out the Notre Dame offensive output.

It's the second-straight season the Irish have lost its ACC opener. They return to non-conference action next week, hosting Boston University Wednesday before Marquette comes to town next Sunday, Dec. 11. The Golden Eagles caught the attention of many with a 96-70 win over No. 6 Baylor earlier this week.

"I told (the team), this is the segment where we need a little bit of a 'first week of practice plan' practices," said Brey of the week ahead. "We've not been able to do that, so that's how we'll start on Monday."

Austin Hough can be reached at austin.hough@goshennews.com or at 574-538-2360. Follow him on Twitter at @AustinHoughTGN.