Now is not the time for despair. I’ll be the first to admit, I woke up a little morose this morning after watching the Irish last night. It was the first time this year Mike Brey’s team couldn’t close the deal in an ACC game. As disappointing as it was to see the Irish fall to the Seminoles 83-80 Wednesday night, now is not the time for despair.

Notre Dame still sits atop the ACC standings and is well ahead of the pace most prognosticators set for the Irish. More importantly, the Irish went on the road against a top-ten team and competed at the highest level. As great as it would have been to fly home from Tallahassee 6-0, life is still great for Irish fans. Let’s use this post as an opportunity to find the bright side.

First, the Irish have a history of struggling against Leonard Hamilton’s better FSU teams. When they’ve been tournament-good, they’ve beaten the Irish handily. Wednesday night, the FSU defense pushed the Irish offense away from the rim. The Seminoles pressured the ball and caused the most ND turnovers this season. FSU attacked the glass relentlessly with length and athleticism among the best in the country.

If these story lines emerged before the game, you’d worry about a blowout. Duke got beat by 16 under similar circumstances. Wednesday was no blow-out. The Irish scratched and clawed their way through a tough road game against a top-ten opponent. They faced great odds and Ol’ Notre Dame nearly won overall.

Notre Dame put up the 4th most efficient offensive performance the Seminoles have seen this season. They managed that efficiency despite a season high in turnovers. The Irish bombed away to nearly 60% eFG shooting to make up for the impact of FSU’s pressure defense. Unfortunately, that great shooting couldn’t overcome the extra shot attempts created by FSU’s 34% offensive rebounding percentage.

T.J. Gibbs

If you’re taking away positives from the end of this brutal road trip, tops among them has to be the performance of T.J. Gibbs. The freshman kept the Irish in the game Wednesday with a fantastic performance. He scored 12 points on 4-5 shooting from the floor. He played a career-high 25 minutes. Most importantly, T.J. proved he can make plays in tough games. When the Irish needed a spark, Gibbs provided it Wednesday. The future is incredibly bright for this young man.

Winning Plays

Since ACC play opened, the narrative on the Irish flipped from a team that couldn’t close games after building big leads to “the greatest closers of all time.” Of course, the truth lies somewhere between the lines. Despite not walking away with the W, Notre Dame made some big plays down the stretch. We’re so used to writing these headlines about Steve Vasturia and Matt Farrell. Wednesday added another name to that mix: Rex Pflueger. Rex scored key three-point baskets late and made the steal that nearly led to tying the game in the final seconds. Stepping up in those kind of moments will be great for the sophomore’s confidence. Rex gives Brey another battle tested option in the clutch.

Bombs Away

One knock on Irish teams of the past was that they could light you up from deep at home, but struggled to consistently bring that with them on the road. Wednesday night, the Irish had six different players score from behind the arc. Of those, Pflueger was the lowest percentage at 1-3. Everyone else shot 75% or better from deep. That’s a hard thing to replicate, but doing it away from Purcell Pavilion is a good sign.

My only concern about shooting was our performance from the line. Normally, you wouldn’t complain about a 71% night from the line, but it felt like the Irish were regressing to the mean. There were a few key misses, including the front end of a 1-1, that really hurt the Irish late.

Managing 8v5

How cliche for the losing team to complain about officiating, no? Perhaps a neutral wouldn’t see it this way, but I’m a homer and I know it. Wednesday night provided ample video evidence of a good ol’ boy screw job. To his credit, Mike Brey stood up for his team in the first half and earned a technical foul. After that point, things somewhat evened out, but if there was a close one or arguable point on Wednesday, it was going against the Irish.

There were more than a few times this game turned on critical judgements that went against the Irish. One 5-0 Seminole run in the first half was fueled by this missed goaltending call.

Another late FSU run was aided by a missed over-and-back call where FSU clearly touched the deflected ball in the front court before picking it up in the back court. T.J. Gibbs went diving for a ball that was obviously off a FSU player, but it went to them.

Throughout the night, there was no way to interpret what contact around the rim the officials interpreted as a foul vs. not. As an Irish fan, the heuristic seemed simple: bump ND guys all you want. The worst occurrence of this was in the first half where Rex Plfueger had his legs taken out on a dunk attempt, and no call was made. Mike Giminski’s blind eye to the contact on the replay only served to rub salt in Irish fans’ wounds.

I’ve often joked that I’d consider giving up football independence to get a fairly officiated basketball game. Wednesday was stereotypical of ND’s ACC experience thus far. Irish fans can take heart that NCAAT games are officiated under a national standard and not within the league.

Final Sequence

This is less of a positive than a chance to provide some clarification. Last night, I was convinced that V.J. Beachem or Bonzie Colson could (and should) have kicked out the ball after Pflueger’s late steal. Replay showed Matt Farrell and Steve Vasturia standing wide open at the arc. As painful as it is to see two clutch shooters ready to tie the game, it would have taken a miracle play to make it happen.

Possibly Beachem could have spun out to the left and found a Farrell, but it would have been a legendary play in all that traffic. Then, you could say that Bonzie should have found Onions atop the key.

I’m not sure that’s reasonable either. The clock is at 1.2s on this screen shot. To spot him, deliver the ball, and get the shot off is difficult in that time frame. The opportunity for an “and-1” is probably as good as the kick-out in that framework.

It is easy to pick this apart like the Zapruder Film because the result didn’t go our way. The truth is, the guys made a hell of an effort in a nearly impossible situation.

Conclusion

Despite all of this, ND competed admirably Wednesday night. Following a brutal three game road trip, the Irish emerged an outstanding 2-1 and 5-1 overall in the league. The ACC media picked ND to finish 7th in the league, and they’ve already defeated one top tier team and stood toe-to-toe with another on the road. This is a gritty group with the talent and skill to compete at the highest level. We thought we saw hints of it in their performance against Villanova. Wednesday night served as confirmation that Mike Brey has something special brewing in South Bend – AGAIN.

It sucks to lose, but it is encouraging to see signs of greatness from an outstanding bunch of guys. Go Irish.