Notre Dame men’s basketball welcomed the Elon Phoenix to Purcell Pavilion on Friday night for the final home game before heading to Las Vegas for the first edition of the Players Era Festival.
Led by head coach Billy Taylor, a 1995 Notre Dame graduate, Elon traveled to South Bend sitting at 2-2 overall. Taylor, who played four years for the Irish under John MacLeod in the early 1990s, guided his group to a resounding 75-48 win at Northern Illinois last time out on Wednesday night. Friday marked Elon’s second matchup against an ACC opponent this season, as they battled North Carolina on opening night, falling 90-76 in Chapel Hill back on November 4th.
On the court, Elon is led by the backcourt duo of TJ and TK Simpkins. The twins out of Brooklyn, New York have combined to average 33 points per game thus far. They are complemented in the high-powered Phoenix offense by sophomore wing Nick Dorn, who averages 15.5 points a night.
For head coach Micah Shrewsberry’s Irish, the offense has been firing on all cylinders to start his second year at the helm. Led by preseason All-ACC first team selection Markus Burton, Notre Dame had scored at least 75 points in each of their four wins to open the campaign. The sophomore guard from right down the road in Mishawaka has averaged 20.5 points, 6.0 rebounds, and 5.3 assists, while flirting with triple-doubles on multiple occasions.
The 4-0 start has also seen the emergence of junior forward Tae Davis, as the Seton Hall transfer has tallied averages of 14.3 points and 6.0 rebounds to begin his breakout season. Despite Tuesday’s 75-58 win over North Dakota, it hasn’t been a spotless week for the Irish, as it was announced that the team would be without freshman guard Sir Mohammed for the foreseeable future, following an unspecified lower body injury to the talented freshman from Charlotte, North Carolina.
Elon began the game full of energy on the defensive end, as their full-court matchup zone gave the Irish offense fits for the first eight minutes. The Phoenix were able to open up a 20-13 lead at the under-12 media timeout, led by the Simpkins brothers. The backcourt pair scored 11 of those first 20 points for the Phoenix, while shooting a perfect 5-5 from the floor.
Coach Shrewsberry was displeased with the defensive effort of his group from the jump, saying postgame, “Our defense let us down from the start, we let them get way too comfortable to start the game.” Shrewsberry continued by saying, “You have to break their confidence early, or they are going to get rolling and it’s going to be a long night for you.”
The players agreed with that assessment, as Kebba Njie attested postgame, proclaiming, “That’s not how we play defense. We didn’t show up on that end, and that’s not how coach Shrewsberry built this program.”
The Irish responded out of that timeout, connecting on seven of their next eight field goal attempts, with Burton knocking down a pair of triples, and Lehigh transfer Burke Chebuhar making good on his first three shots of the evening. Notre Dame, which had averaged 83.5 points per game on over 53% shooting from the field, continued their hot shooting throughout the remainder of the first half, taking a 46-41 advantage into the locker rooms.
After shooting just 3-17 from beyond the arc against North Dakota, the Irish torched the nets in the opening frame, connecting on eight treys. Burton led the charge with 13 points, complemented by sophomore guard Braeden Shrewsberry with 10, graduate guard Matt Allocco with eight and Chebuhar with seven.
The concerns for Shrewsberry’s defense, the club’s hallmark a year ago, continued though as Dorn and TK Simpkins faced little defensive resistance in collecting a combined 25 points in the first 20 minutes. Despite giving up just over 64 points per game, the Irish have had trouble guarding the perimeter this season, and the Elon backcourt continued to expose the Irish with efficient guard play.
The Irish continued to struggle to slow down Dorn and Simpkins coming out of the intermission, as the pair scored 11 of Elon’s first 14 points, allowing the Phoenix to level matters at 54 apiece at the under-16 timeout. Shortly thereafter, a Dorn slam gave Elon their first lead of the half, but Braeden Shrewsberry answered right back with a crucial four-point play.
A nearly four-minute Notre Dame scoring drought saw Elon take a 68-65 lead, before Burton steadied the Irish with his ninth field goal of the night, upping his total to 23 points. Shrewsberry’s fifth triple a minute later knotted the score at 70 with five minutes to play.
Notre Dame led 75-74 with 90 seconds remaining, but two turnovers and just two makes over their last 10 shots sealed the Irish’s fate, as Elon escaped with a shocking 84-77 victory. Two short-range misses from Burton and an ill-timed turnover from Shrewsberry spoiled Notre Dame’s last-ditch efforts, and the Irish added a critical quad-3 home loss to their resume. Friday’s loss also marked the third buy game defeat under Coach Shrewsberry, following home losses to Western Carolina and The Citadel a year prior. It was also Elon’s first victory over the Irish, as Notre Dame had previously led the all-time series 2-0.
Elon shot over 60% from the field and was perfect from the charity stripe in the second half, en route to outscoring Notre Dame 43-31 over the final 20 minutes. Dorn led the Phoenix with 24 points on an outstanding 8-10 shooting from the field and 5-6 shooting from three-point territory. The Simpkins brothers matched their averages, scoring 17 and 16 apiece to tally their 33 combined. Junior forward Sam Sherry also added 13 points to contribute to Elon’s first victory over a power-conference opponent since a 65-53 triumph over South Carolina all the way back on November 21, 2012.
Burton and Shrewsberry teamed up to score 47 on nine three-pointers, but outside of the renowned backcourt, no other Irish scored in double-figures. The lack of offensive spark led coach Micah Shrewsberry to turn to freshman guard Cole Certa for his first action since Stonehill, but even the sharpshooter from IMG Academy couldn’t save the Irish. “We needed somebody to make a shot or somebody to make a play. I was hoping he could come in and give us a spark from the perimeter,” said Shrewsberry on the decision to turn to Certa in the second half.
“Nothing special has to change. We just got to be better and we’re gonna work hard and learn from this, and we better improve for next week,” Allocco said postgame. The fifth-year senior has been through his fair share of ups and downs in his career with Princeton, and the onus will fall on him and the upperclassmen to prepare the Irish for a brutal upcoming schedule.
Notre Dame was also punished on the glass, as Elon controlled the rebounding battle 35-24. Shrewsberry didn’t attribute that to a lack of physicality from his frontcourt, rather expressing his displeasure with the officiating, frustratedly saying, “We were making contact and boxing out and fouls were 8-2 on us. We need some real officials, I thought that was stupid. What the f**k are you supposed to do if you can’t be physical?”
The vibes across the hall in the visiting locker room were much different, especially for Taylor, who “still bleeds Notre Dame” nearly thirty years after he captained the 1994-95 team during his senior year. Speaking with the media postgame, Taylor said, “Very weird for me being back in here. All the way back to being a 17-year-old in this room on my recruiting visit trying to figure out the next steps in my life.” Taylor also thought their earlier battle in Chapel Hill prepared his team and provided a necessary confidence, saying, “We proved a lot at Carolina, but we also learned from that contest, and our execution down the stretch was as good as you can ask for.”
The 4-1 Irish will now make the trip to the Strip, as they will compete in the eight-team field of the inaugural Players Era Festival, held at MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada. This unique, multi-team “Feast Week” event will be the first college basketball in-season tournament to compensate student-athletes through various name, image, and likeness (NIL) activities throughout the week.
The Irish open the competition late next Tuesday night, as they will do battle with the No. 24-ranked Rutgers Scarlet Knights, in a first-round contest set for a 10:30 p.m. tip. The Irish will then play perennial Final Four contender No. 7 Houston at 12:30 a.m. on Thanksgiving, before wrapping up on Saturday against an opponent still yet to be determined later. The remainder of the field includes No. 8 Alabama, No. 14 Creighton, No. 23 Texas A&M, Oregon and San Diego State, with all games broadcasted on TBS and streamed on Max.
