Irish 3s rain on Hoyas

• Article
• Comments ()
• Click-2-Listen
• Videos

By

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- There's no defense for desperation.

With its NCAA tournament hopes teetering in the balance, Notre Dame was simply hungrier than Georgetown last night at Joyce Convocation Center. Thanks to the daylight provided by their superior intensity, the Irish buried the Hoyas 70-64 under a hail of 3-pointers.

The loss snapped Georgetown's three-game winning streak and sends the Hoyas (16-7, 8-4 Big East) to St. John's on Sunday in need of a solid four-game finish to cement their NCAA tournament resume.

If the Hoyas split their final four to compile a 10-6 league record, they almost certainly will get an at-large bid to the tournament. In the 25-year history of the league, only two of the 55 Big East teams with 10-6 records did not make the NCAAs.

"We need to bounce back from this game and get ready for St. John's," said Georgetown junior forward Brandon Bowman, who led the Hoyas with 17 points and seven rebounds. "It's February. It's time to win."

Time was ticking much quicker on Notre Dame's tournament hopes last night. After losing their first meeting with the Hoyas at MCI Center on Jan.[ThSp]23, the Irish (15-7, 7-5) arrived at the rematch sixth in the league and virtually in must-win territory at home.

Thanks to a brilliant combination of halfcourt defense and 3-point marksmanship, particularly in the opening half, Notre Dame made good on that mandate in front of a sellout crowd of 11,418.

The last thing Irish coach and DeMatha product Mike Brey did before collecting his 100th victory at Notre Dame was review tape of Georgetown's last loss, a 15-point setback at Boston College on Jan.[ThSp]29 in which the Hoyas had more turnovers (14) than points (12) in the first half. Brey noted that the Eagles focused on two defensive keys in that game: taking away the backdoor cuts which are central to Georgetown's Princeton-style offense and denying the open 3-pointer.

"Obviously, you have to give up something, so we decided not to double inside," Brey said. "You have to eat some post stuff against [Roy] Hibbert and [Jeff] Green, which we did. But for the most part, I think we did a phenomenal job defensively. In the first half, they had one 3-pointer and one backdoor cut, which came on the first play of the game. Other than that, I thought we set the tone, we dictated the game. [EnLeader] It was a lot like that [Boston College] game quite frankly."

You don't have to tell Georgetown fans, who watched on ESPN Classic as the Hoyas sputtered to 17 first-half points with an offense that certainly qualified as vintage. In part thanks to Notre Dame's aggressive and well-conceived defense, the Hoyas looked hapless before intermission.

Five-time Big East rookie of the week Green, who recorded seven of his nine points and five of his six assists in the second half, played his most passive period of the season. Freshman point man Jonathan Wallace continued his midseason swoon from behind the 3-point arc (4-for-24 in his last seven games). And the rest of the Hoyas took turns bumping into one another coming off cuts, lobbing ill-advised lazy passes and standing around as the motion offense practiced by coach John Thompson III stagnated.

The result was a 10-minute field goal drought in the late stages of the half that allowed the Irish to go on a 14-0 run and bolt to a 28-12 lead with 2:44 remaining. Notre Dame did most of its damage from behind the arc, drilling six triples in the half. But the Hoyas aided the Irish cause with some suspect defense, repeatedly losing Notre Dame gunner Chris Quinn and even committing the tragic fundamental error of fouling him on another attempt.

"They're shooting snowballs," said Thompson. "I think at halftime they had eight field goals, and six of them were 3-pointers. We gave them some good looks, but part of that is the beauty of their team [-] they put four or five guys on the floor that can burn you from deep."

Notre Dame finished the game 10-for-20 from 3-point range, with off-guard Chris Quinn (18 points) ripping all four of his attempts and senior point man Chris Thomas (21 points) adding a pair of bombs and reaching the free-throw line at will on dribble-drive moves.

Notre Dame's superb first-half shooting, coupled with the Hoyas' drought, staked the Irish to a 30-17 lead at intermission. And though the Hoyas battled to within six points three times in the second half, they were never able to really threaten.

The lone high point for the Hoyas was the play of freshman center Hibbert, who finished with 15 points on six of 10 shooting and dominated Notre Dame pivot man Torin Francis on the defensive end.