For 20 minutes Tuesday afternoon in Atlanta, Notre Dame couldn’t have played much worse.
And this Irish team, one that’s currently high on fragility and low on firepower, doesn’t have close to that kind of margin for error.
Falling behind to Georgia Tech by 19 at halftime, 43-24, Notre Dame played well enough offensively in the second half to make a game of it, but nowhere near well enough defensively to overcome an 86-75 loss in front of 4,914 in McCamish Pavilion in Atlanta.
After earning its first win this season over a power conference team, the Yellowjackets improved to 1-2 in the Atlantic Coast Conference and 7-7 overall.
The Irish, still playing without 18-point scorer Markus Burton (leg injury), dropped to 7-6 overall and 1-1 in the ACC.
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“We’ve gotta be ready to go to start the game, turning up what we do in practice,” Irish coach Micah Shrewsberry said in the postgame press conference. “Because at the start of the game, we were surprised by things that we had talked about and showed [the team] on film.
“And you know, that's on me for not having these guys ready to go where they need to be — but it won't happen again.”
The Irish had limited opponents to 41.7% shooting from the field coming into the game, but a particularly passive effort in the first half ended with Georgia Tech shooting 57% from the field for the game, including 8-for-20 (40%) from the 3-point line. Easier Tech buckets came on a 12-3 edge in fastbreak points.
Particularly painful was yielding 44 points to the Georgia Tech subs.
Javian McCollum, a transfer from Oklahoma averaging 11 points a game, and Duncan Powell, a transfer from Sacramento State averaging 6.7 points, led Tech with 21 points each, combining to go 13-for-26 (5-for-11) on 3.
The Irish, who shot just 28% percent in the first half, had no such significant burst from the bench, which delivered 15 points. Notre Dame was able to pull it together for a good chunk of the second half to push Tech.
More aggressive offensively, the Irish drew five Georgia Tech fouls in the first three minutes of the second half and forced 6-9 sophomore Baye Ndongo to the bench almost immediately. He was limited to 20 minutes, though he still finished with 10 points and team-high six rebounds.
After a dunk by ND’s Kebba Njie and a 10-footer by Matt Allocco, the Irish reduced the deficit to three with 5:53 to go, and a driving layup by Tae Davis kept things interesting at 72-68 with 4:33 to go.
But that’s about all the run the Irish had in them as they fell behind by 11 over the next two minutes.
A Davis three-point play with 2:26 to go pulled them back within eight, but the Irish couldn’t keep Tech out of the lane or off the foul line over the remaining time to make up any ground. Tech hit seven of eight free throws over the final 3:09.
Shrewsberry thought the Irish should have had more than 14 attempts.
“I thought we did a better job of trying to be aggressive,” Shrewsberry said. “We were driving the ball, right? They picked up a bunch of fouls early in the second half because we were attacking the rim, and then they must have done a really good job late in the second half, because those same fouls didn't happen when we kept driving the rim.
“It was disappointing to me. We attacked the rim the whole second half and only shoot 14 free throws. It's crazy.”
The Irish hit 12 of those free throw attempts, and Tech went 18-for-25.
From the tip, Tech was more physical defensively and the Irish couldn’t shake the first half pressure.
ND’s Braeden Shrewsberry, a 16.5-point-a-game scorer, struggled to find any space at all and went 0-for-4 in the first half. He finished with 12, helping the Irish get back in it by going 4-for-6 on 3s in the second half.
Davis, averaging almost 16 a game, was terrific over the final 20 minutes after being held to five in the first half. Taking over in the lane, the 6-9 sophomore powered his way to a 27-point game on 9-for-16 shooting, helping the Irish to shoot 60% in the second half and 43.5 for the game.
The third double-figure scorer was Allocco, who came in averaging just under 10 a game, but had 11 in the second half to finish with 15.
Freshman Sir Mohammed made a three-minute return to action for the first time since he had surgery on Nov. 18 for a lower-leg injury.
It was the third game of the season overall for the freshman, who Rivals listed as the 62nd-best player in the country as a senior. The 6-6 guard hit his only shot attempt – a 3-pointer in the first half.
Tech had a 30-29 edge on the boards, but the Irish had 14 offensive rebounds to the Yellowjackets’ nine. Tech got 38 of its points in the paint and the Irish had 36. And the Irish had 10 turnovers to Tech’s eight.
Notre Dame leads the all-time series, 18-14, and last year topped Tech in three close contests as both rebuilding programs try to regain footing in the ACC.
“I think Damon's [Stoudamire] one of the coaches I really, really, respect, not only in this league, but across the country,” coach Shrewsberry said. “You know, he's a competitor. I'm a competitor. Our teams are gonna fight hard.
“Right now, we both have good talent, but we don't have the best talent in the league. I think we're at the same level, like both being new head coaches in this league.
“You know, we're both fighting to get our guys to compete on a daily basis, and then when we get the players, which we're both starting to get right now, we can take off if we continue to play that way and play hard every single night.
“So, he's doing a better job than I am because I didn't have our guys ready to go tonight, and he did.”
Notre Dame hosts North Carolina on Saturday at noon (CBS).
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