Wake Forest's Intensity Too Much for Notre Dame in ACC Tournament
Notre Dame (13-20) created a hole it couldn’t quite dig out of on Wednesday afternoon as the Fighting Irish fell 72-59 to Wake Forest (20-12) in the second round of the ACC Tournament.
Wake Forest started fast by hitting its first five field goal attempts to take an early 16-6 lead and the game stayed in that range for most of the game. The Demon Deacons led by as many 16 halfway through the second half, but Notre Dame found a way to whittle the lead to nine points three times over the final 12 minutes.
“Credit to Wake Forest,” said Notre Dame head coach Micah Shrewsberry. “Just an old, veteran team that was trying to get to the NCAA Tournament. That’s what they look like and that’s how they played. I thought they started the game with a little more juice than we did and got to a quick 8-0 run. We just played from behind the whole game.”
The most significant issue for Notre Dame came on the offensive end as they shot 29 percent from the field for the game and just 5-for-25 in the final 20 minutes. Wake Forest could have run away from the Irish, but Notre Dame hit 15-of-16 from the line in the second half and 25-for-28 for the game.
Shooting issues aside, Notre Dame allowed the Demon Deacons to shoot 46 percent for the game and score 38 points in the paint to just 14 from the Irish. Wake Forest also outscored the Irish 15-5 in fastbreak points.
While Notre Dame didn’t get blown out, it was a similar story. The Irish couldn’t come up with a run to get to game situations or take the lead. There was never a sense of urgency from Notre Dame while Wake Forest was playing for its postseason life.
“You've got to use all your effort to come back,” Shrewsberry explained. “I don't know if it was energy early. You talk about desperate teams - they lose this game, they're not going to the NCAA Tournament. Everybody knows that probably for a fact.
“This is a game they had to have and it looked like a veteran team that understood that, that knew that, that knew how they had to start this game to come out on top.”
Markus Burton led the Irish with 21 points, including 12-for-12 from the foul line, but he shot just 4-of-16 from the field. Sophomore Tae Davis tallied 16 points on 4-of-6 shooting and 8-of-10 from the free throw line. Carey Booth added 11 points including 3-of-8 from three.
Wake Forest was led by Boopie Miller’s 17 points and seven boards, while Andrew Carr scored 12 points and pulled down 11 rebounds. The Irish did do another fine job on Hunter Sallis as he scored 14 points on just 4-of-14 from the field.
Outside of the poor shooting, former Notre Dame signee Parker Friedrichsen came up big and allowed Wake Forest to pull away. Friedrichsen scored seven points and recorded three backbreaking steals in the second half.
The biggest Friedrichsen play came as part of a 7-0 run to push the lead to 16, as his steal and layup were sandwiched between a layup from Carr and a three-ball from Cameron Hildreth.
LACK OF OFFENSE
The offensive struggles were somewhat unexpected given Notre Dame had found success over the last few weeks scoring the basketball. Sure, the Irish did play yesterday, but shooting 29 percent for a college basketball game is far from a fatigued team.
In fact, Notre Dame got a Davis layup with 3:13 remaining in the first half and wouldn’t score a field goal until Davis hit another lay in with 13:33 left in the game. Now, the stretch didn’t necessarily kill Notre Dame as Wake Forest only increased the lead by two, but the Irish failed to make up ground during a key stretch.
Wake Forest saw Burton score a career-high 31 points in the last meeting and head coach Steve Forbes made sure that didn’t happen again.
“This game we wanted to make Burton a passer,” stated Forbes. “Not let him get downhill in the ball screen and the zoom action. I thought we did a really good job of that for the most part. We weren't in the drop this time. We were up to touch, not letting him turn the corner.
“We switched our matchups. We let Cameron guard Shrewsberry. Boopie did an unbelievable job on Burton. I thought that was a big thing for us.”
Shrewsberry felt the referees let Wake Forest get a little too physical as he had some subtle remarks on how Notre Dame might need to adjust how they play defense next year.
“I thought they did a good job defensively,” explained Shrewsberry. “I need to go back and maybe re-teach how we're guarding because I think the level of physicality that people have used or freedom of movement isn't a thing anymore because Markus and Braeden don't get freedom of movement. They're not allowed to move, they're not allowed to cut, so we need to change how we guard them, and we need to not let people run and cut.
“I'm teaching our guys the wrong thing by thinking I'm teaching the right thing. Maybe I need to change our strategy and hold and grab and not let people cut because that's what people did to us all year.”
Now, Shrewsberry did give Wake Forest credit for playing with physicality as the game dictated.
“If you take those two guys away, it's a big part of what we do, and people just got physical with them and didn't let them run off screen, didn't let them cut. We got to the basket some, missed some, got to the free-throw line and made a good amount, but they just make it tough on you.”
THE FUTURE
It’s not all doom and gloom for Notre Dame as they overachieved in many areas this season. A year ago, Notre Dame finished 11-21 and just 3-17 in ACC play. Progress was made this year and the future remains bright given the freshmen and sophomore core.
There were plenty of times Notre Dame could have thrown in the towel, but they refused and there is hope the program is a few pieces away from making noise next season.
“I think it's a big step for us knowing that we're all new, we're all new to this and we're all young too,” said Burton. “It's a bigger picture in the long run, but it was a great season. We did what we were supposed to. We fought all season long, and just know we'll be back.”
For Davis, he plans to use the season's ups and downs during the offseason.
“It's motivation,” Davis said. “It puts a fire and a fuel in you. Honestly, I think we took great steps this year.”
UP NEXT
Transfer Portal season.
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