Irish Unable To Overcome First-Half Offensive Woes Against Georgia Tech
A poor first half offensively proved too much for Notre Dame (13-4, 3-1 ACC) to overcome in a 60-53 loss at Georgia Tech (9-7, 2-2 ACC) Wednesday night.
The Irish scored just 20 points in the first half while shooting 25.8 percent (8 of 31) from the field, but found a way to battle back and even took a 38-37 lead with 11:16 remaining. The Yellow Jackets, however, responded and held on to pick up the their second league win of the year.
Here is Blue & Gold Illustrated’s half-by-half recap of the Irish defeat.
FIRST HALF
Georgia Tech jumped out to an early 4-0 lead behind baskets from guard Josh Okogie and forward Abdoulaye Gueye.
The Irish missed their first five shots from the floor before getting baskets on back-to-back possessions from senior big man Martinas Geben and sophomore guard T.J. Gibbs. Georgia Tech head coach Josh Pastner called a timeout following Gibbs’ basket with the teams tied 4-4 at the 16:41 mark.
Notre Dame continued to struggle on offense over the next two minutes, missing three shots while Georgia Tech took a 6-4 lead into the first media timeout. (14:56).
Junior big man Elijah Burns, who earned the start, knocked down two free throws to tie the game up at 6-6 after the timeout.
Both teams started to find a little bit more of a rhythm offensively, trading buckets on four straight possessions, including baskets by senior big man Austin Torres and sophomore big man John Mooney.
Georgia Tech held a 15-12 lead with the 11:11 left in the half with the Irish shooting just 5 of 16 (31.3 percent) from the floor.
Notre Dame got a couple nice plays from Geben over the next few minutes, including a pick-and-roll with junior guard Rex Pflueger, and led 18-17 with 7:37 remaining.
Georgia Tech finally got some buckets to fall and went on a 6-0 run fueled by two baskets from Gueye to ignite the crowd. The run forced Irish head coach Mike Brey to take a timeout with his team down 23-18 and just more than four minutes remaining in the half.
Through 16 minutes of game action, Notre Dame shot 8 of 25 from the floor, including 0 of 7 on three-pointers.
Geben’s dunk at the 8:55 mark wound up being the last made field goal for the Irish the rest of the half, with the team missing its final 11 shots. Free throws by Mooney were the only two points Brey’s group scored during that time span.
Georgia Tech took advantage extending the 6-0 run up to 13-0 to take a 30-20 lead heading into the break.
Notre Dame finished the half 8 of 31 (25.8 percent) from the floor, including 0 of 9 from behind the arc. Mooney led the Irish with eight points, while Geben contributed six points and seven rebounds.
The Yellow Jackets shot 13 of 31 (41.9 percent) in the first 20 minutes, while getting eight points from Okogie and six each from Gueye and big man Ben Lammers.
SECOND HALF
Notre Dame started the second half off by making three of its first six shots, but was unable to shrink Georgia Tech’s lead much trailing 35-26 at the under-16 media timeout.
Sophomore guard Nik Djogo connected on the team’s first three-pointer to cut the lead to 35-29, but Georgia Tech answered with a jumper from Gueye with the shot clock expiring for a 37-29 lead with just more 14 minutes remaining in the contest.
Notre Dame started to gain some momentum and went on a 9-0 run to take a 38-37 lead thanks to four points from Geben and five from Gibbs. It was the first lead for the Irish since taking a 18-17 advantage with 8:55 left in the first half.
The Yellow Jackets responded on the next possession, getting a tip-in from Lammers after he rebounded his own miss. Georgia Tech led 39-38 with 10:27 left going into the under-12 media timeout.
Both teams traded baskets before Georgia Tech went on a 10-2 run to push its lead to 52-43 behind three-pointers from guard Tadric Jackson and Okogie. Freshman wing D.J. Harvey got a three to fall for the Irish to stop the momentum, but the Yellow Jackets led 52-46 with 6:30 remaining.
Harvey got another big three to fall just more than two minutes later to cut the Georgia Tech lead to 54-51, but Lammers answered on the other end with a basket of his own. Pastner called for timeout following the play with his team up 56-51 with 3:36 left.
The Irish had several chances late to continue chipping away into the Georgia Tech lead, but the Yellow Jackets hung on for a 60-53 win to give Notre Dame its first loss in the ACC. Notre Dame missed its final five shots over the last couple minutes of action.
Geben led the way for the Irish with a career-high 16 points and nine rebounds. Mooney contributed a personal-best 11 points and eight rebounds, while Gibbs also scored 11 and dished out seven assists. Pflueger was held scoreless after tallying in double digits in eight of the previous 10 games.
Notre Dame shot 35.6 percent (21 of 59) overall, including 4 of 18 (22.2 percent) behind the arc.
Okogie scored a game-high 17 points to help give the Yellow Jackets the win. Jackson scored 11 points off the bench, while Lammers secured a double-double with 10 points and 10 rebounds.
----
• Talk about it inside Rockne’s Roundtable
• Subscribe to our podcast on iTunes
• Learn more about our print and digital publication, Blue & Gold Illustrated.
• Follow us on Twitter: @BGINews, @BGI_LouSomogyi, @BGI_CoachD,
@BGI_DMcKinney and @BGI_CoreyBodden.
• Like us on Facebook.