BELLY OF THE BE-AST: IRISH BROKEN BY 'NOVA

March 3, 2009

by Ray Mernagh


Last night Notre Dame still had hope, with a really good Villanova team visiting South Bend, that a season full of endless struggles could be saved. After losing at Connecticut last weekend, every single Irishmen inside the Joyce Center's locker room knew this game, plus the next one against St. John's, were must wins. Victory in both would -- amazingly -- have them in position, with some light lifting at the Garden next week, to receive an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament. Coach Mike Brey confirmed this belief before the game to the ESPN cameras when he said they "needed to win 1 of these 2" games in the UConn/'Nova stretch. What he didn't say, or more likely what wasn't shown or asked, was how the Irish planned on doing that.



When given the opportunity to spend time with a coach before a game, any media scribe worth his Morton's will try and find out what that coach wants his team to take away from the opposition. Do they want to take away the dribble-drive to the middle by shading the defense towards the baseline, or take away the baseline by shading towards the lane? Maybe they want to trap the other team's primary ball handler whenever possible so that he'll have to give the ball up to a less-capable decision maker. Do they want to chase the other team's two best three-point shooters off the line and make them drive the ball because they tend to turn it over when attempting a blow-by dribble on a hard closeout?

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The same questions can apply offensively too. Do they want to drive and kick? Bring the other team's big man out top so the driving lanes are more open? Run a particular defender through a ton of screens all night long? Feed the post and play inside-out? Run off misses? What about makes? Look for the trailers on the secondary break? Even when the opportunity to pick the staff's brain is denied, it's usually easy enough to figure out the game-plan -- on both ends of the court -- within the first five minutes of action. All you have to do is pay attention to the floor and then look to the bench's reaction to what happens at the end of each possession. If the bench, meaning the coaches, are clapping that means they're happy with what just happened. If they're pointing at a player to go into the game and the kid coming out is getting a saliva shower as he's dressed down about his role in what just transpired -- you can assume whatever he did wasn't part of the plan discussed ad nauseum for the last 36 hours.

Having said all that, and after watching the tape of Villanova's 77-60 win at least three times, I'm still stymied about what Notre Dame's plan was. Villanova's defensive plan was clearly to take away Kyle McAlarney's open looks and to push Harangody off the block and frustrate him. The 'Nova plan on offense was to attack the inept Irish D with ball-screens, which they've refused to defend all year, plus go right at Harangody in the post.

Notre Dame is a team that seems to want to trade baskets in the hope that at some point you'll start missing yours. That seems to be their plan in every game. I know Mike Brey is a good coach. I've got to believe he has more of a plan than that -- but his players don't seem capable of executing any plan other than the "we're gonna outscore you" one. It just doesn't work when there's literally no desire at all, by anyone other than Tory Jackson and Tyrone Nash, to play any kind of defense. It also doesn't help when a great college guard like Scottie Reynolds is completely comfortable in what's supposed to be a hostile setting. Reynolds toyed with the Irish all night, while Dante Cunningham and Shane Clark's work against Harangody should put any argument about him being Player of the Year in the league on mute.

A few examples I'll highlight here explain Notre Dame's troubles this season far more than the brutal Big East TV schedule they've played does.

1) Villanova's first bucket of the game, a three by Scottie Reynolds, comes after a brutal Dante Cunningham ball screen all but knocks Tory Jackson the 167.9 miles back to his native Saginaw, Michigan. Obviously nobody communicated with Jackson on the play. In this instance it was Harangody who compounded the mistake by not even attempting to hedge or get an effective hand up on Reynolds. It's happened all year, in every Notre Dame game I've seen, they just switch ball-screens. Maybe Jackson would've tried to get over the screen if he'd only known it was coming. It's just a huge error in fundamentals. The following three-step process in playing the ball-screen comes right out of the Charlie Coles taught Basketball Theory class at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. One -- You tell the guy on the ball the screen is coming. Two -- You hedge up on the high-side of the screen to stop the dribbler's momentum. Three -- the on the ball defender fights over the screen, gets in front of his man again and you recover back on your man. There's a theory out there that this ND team lacks athleticism and quickness. The theory has a lot of merit with some of their players. It has none with both Jackson and Harangody. Anyone who saw the big guy catch that long pass in transition, dribble and then spin last night isn't being honest if they think Luke can't hedge on a ball screen and recover. He just doesn't want to.

2) On another defensive possession Tory Jackson denies an entry pass into the post by using a lot of effort, ultimately kicking out his leg and stopping it with his foot. This results in Jackson being stretched to the point of doing the splits and he falls awkwardly to the ground. Three of his teammates look at him -- they see him on the floor after making a solid defensive play -- and not one comes over with a hand to help him up.

3) At the 5:00 mark in the second half Dwayne Anderson of Villanova shoots an air ball. Harangody starts to run ahead on offense, assuming Ryan Ayers will come up with the miss. By the time Corey Stokes out-physicals Ayers for the ball, Harangody is almost to the free throw line. He can't do anything but look back as the uncovered Anderson dunks the ball for a 67-51 lead. Harangody was benched right after this and despite what Brey claimed after the game, I think this is the coach's attempt to bring out the Donovan McNabb in his All-American down the stretch. Lord knows he's gotta try something.

The three examples offered above are simple, fundamental things -- defending a ball screen, helping up a teammate that fell because he hustled, and boxing out a shooter until your team has possession of the ball -- that good teams do. Notre Dame didn't do any of them. The Irish were supposed to be a desperate team last night. Instead, they appeared entitled.

One of the announcers argued that Notre Dame "has proven they can beat really good teams" this season when talking about the Irish's at-large hopes. I agree. Notre Dame has proven they can beat really good teams exactly once this year. They beat Texas, who I'd call a decent team, 81-80 in November. They beat a very good team, Louisville, last month in a game that Rick Pitino used as a teaching tool by sitting down his starters in the second half.

Notre Dame has lost to every other good team they've played. The only hope the Irish have now of an NCAA berth is to win five games in a row next week in the 2009 Big East Tournament next week in New York City. There's only one problem -- Notre Dame just isn't a very good team.

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Ray Mernagh is the Basketball Editor for the Pittsburgh Sports Report and writes for Basketball Times as well as his own blog, Hoop Wise. Ray's first book, 1 Chance 2 Dance: A Season Inside Mid-Major Hoops in Mid-America, focuses on 18 months of MAC basketball.

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