Notre Dame withstood two Louisville possessions at the end of regulation and then scored the first 14 points in overtime to secure a thrilling 89-79 victory.   Ben Hansbrough scored 28 points for the Irish, and Tim Abromaitis added 23 points.  Kyle Kuric matched Hansbrough’s game high point total for Louisville.

Abromaitis and Carleton Scott led ND with 8 rebounds each to lead the Irish to a 42-30 rebounding advantage.  The team had just 7 turnovers against a UL defense that averaged over 8 steals per game and forced 15 turnovers per game in previous Big East contests.  Eric Atkins came off the bench to lead the team with 6 assists, and he did not commit a single turnover.  When a team has to scrap to get to overtime, those statistical advantages matter.

The lead changed 10 times in a game where only UL was up by more than 5 points in regulation, a 34-26 lead that was eradicated two minutes later.   Hansbrough kept Notre Dame in the game early with four three point baskets in the first 10 minutes, and Jack Cooley kept his team in the game late in the first half with 10 points on 5-5 shooting.

“We couldn’t get anything flowing on offense, so I knew that something needed to happen,” Cooley said.  “I just tried to help pick it up.”

Two of Cooley’s five baskets were the result of offensive rebounds when his team was struggling to score.  His final basket came from a nice post move gave the Irish a 38-37 lead with 1:20 left in the half; but the Cardinals retaliated with a Terrence Jennings drive and a pair of fast break scores, the latter a three point play by Kuric with a second to play in the half.  Kuric was assessed a technical foul for taunting, and a pair of Abromaitis free throws cut the UL lead to 4 points and, more importantly, killed the buzz of the 7 point run.

Louisville Head Coach Rick Pitino didn’t think much of the technical foul call.  “He said Kyle looked at [Scott Martin], so that was considered taunting,” Pitino said.  “First of all, he’s a mime.  At first the ref said Kyle said something, but [Kyle] hasn’t said anything in three years.  He’s a complete mime.  He’s the nicest young man on the team.”

Notre Dame Head Coach Mike Brey only said, “We were lucky to be down by only 4 at the half.”

The two teams parried throughout the second half.  Both had runs, but neither able to run away from the other.  Louisville took a 72-70 lead to the final TV timeout with 3:13 to play, but Hansbrough tied the game with a driving basket on ND’s next possession.  UL countered with a Jennings basket on a pretty screen-roll pass from Peyton Siva.  Ty Nash was fouled and made a pair of free throws to tie the game at 74 at the 1:02 mark, and a dramatic finish was afoot.

Excellent man-to-man defense forced Preston Knowles into a desperation three point attempt with the shot clock expiring and 26 seconds to play; but Hansbrough dropped the ball out of bounds to give the Cardinals a chance to take the last shot.  The Irish showed man-to-man again as Louisville held the ball between the rings; but they shifted into zone when the clock hit 0:12, and Louisville was confused.  The result was a off balance shot by Knowles that missed, and it was on to overtime.

Brey decided to make the switch to zone during the play.  “We did not talk about it in the timeout,” said Brey.  We kind of changed on the fly, and we did a great job.  That is veteran guys making it work. That helped us. It changed their rhythm a little bit.”

Overtime was Carleton Scott time.  He opened the extra period with a three and went on to score 9 points and pull down a pair of rebounds in extra time.  No play said ND would win more than Scott’s layup and free throw with 3:12 left.  Louisville had position on a Hansbrough miss from the baseline, but Nash punched the ball towards Martin who redirected it to Scott who finished the play to give the Irish an 82-74 victory.  It was all over but the shouting, and the crowd was doing just that.

Noteworthy

• Louisville prepared a new offense with this game in mind.  “We put in a new offense to go against them and have worked on it the past two weeks,” said Louisville Head Coach Rick Pitino.  It’s a pure motion offense, and we got the ball inside, made great cuts, and made great plays.”
• Notre Dame’s victory coupled with the evening’s other conference results put it solidly in second place.  Georgetown beat Syracuse, and Rutgers beat Villanova; so 3 loss ND holds the head-to-head tie breaker with all of the 4 loss teams except Villanova which it has yet to play.  Effectively, ND has a 2 game lead over Georgetown, Louisville, and Connecticut.
• Eric Atkins’ 6 assists and 0 turnovers improved his conference assist/turnover ratio to a league leading 3.0.
• The Irish made 41% of their shots in the first half, 50% in the second half, and 71% in overtime.  Free throws tracked similarly – 63%, 73%, and 80%.
• Louisville’s shooting tracked in the opposite direction – 56%, 46%, and 25%.

Next

The Irish will travel to Tampa to play South Florida at noon on Saturday.  We’ll have a preview for you Friday evening after the hockey game.