Men's Basketball: Comeback Falls Short
January 09, 2010 10:48 PM | General
January 9, 2010
BOX SCORE
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| Kevin Jones |
Luke Harangody scored 24 points and Tim Abromaitis added 17 to lead Notre Dame to a 70-68 victory over eighth-rated West Virginia Saturday night at Purcell Pavilion at the Joyce Center in Notre Dame, Ind.
West Virginia (12-2, 3-1) nearly erased a 22-point deficit, cutting Notre Dame’s lead to one, 67-66, when Dalton Pepper hit a 3 with 4:55 remaining.
Trailing 70-66, Joe Mazzulla made a driving lay up with 53 seconds left to pull the Mountaineers to within two of the Irish. West Virginia had an opportunity to tie or win the game following Ben Hansbrough’s miss, but Da’Sean Butler’s 3-point try was long with two seconds left.
“In this league you have to play for 40 minutes and we didn’t play for 40 minutes,” said West Virginia coach Bob Huggins. “With that being said we still had a chance to win the game.”
The game was a tale of two halves for West Virginia.
In the first half, the Mountaineers couldn’t hit anything and Notre couldn’t miss. The Irish built a 45-25 halftime lead on the 3-point shooting of Harangody and Abromaitis.
“They did anything they wanted to do,” said Huggins of Notre Dame's first-half play.
In the second half, it was West Virginia using the 3-ball to get back in the game. The Mountaineers wound up launching 37 3s, making 12, including three each by Da’Sean Butler and Truck Bryant.
“Da’Sean didn’t make any shots but he competes,” said Huggins.
Butler had a rough night shooting, making just 4 of 20 including 3 of 12 from behind the arc. Butler wasn’t alone. Wellington Smith was 3 for 10, Devin Ebanks was 0 for 4 and Bryant was 4 for 11.
Kevin Jones managed to put back some of those misses, finishing with a 17-point, 10-rebound double-double.
West Virginia shot 37.5% overall and was just 2 of 4 from the free throw line. Notre Dame shot 20 more free throws, and finished 17 of 24 from the charity stripe.
“We shot 37 3s and that’s not us,” said Huggins. “Individually we’re not very good. Now we can be pretty good collectively. We just don’t have guys that can make plays off the bounce.”
The Irish were 23 of 43 from the floor for 53.5% including 7 of 13 from 3.
“They shot 53% against us and this is the same group that gave up 39% a year ago in the best conference in the history of college basketball,” said Huggins. “We’re just not getting it done from a defensive standpoint and then we do things from an offensive standpoint that I don’t understand.”
The loss was the Mountaineers’ 10th straight at the Joyce Center dating back to 1996. West Virginia is now 3-15 all-time at the facility.
“We lose by 20 or we lose by two, what’s the difference?” said Huggins. “At the end of the day you don’t win championships and you don’t hang banners by losing. That’s the bottom line.
“I’m not into moral victories and I’m not going to go in there and tell them, hey, ‘Great job and great comeback.’ What I told them is, ‘You didn’t bring your behind to play.’ We just didn’t come to play.”
Notre Dame bumps its record to 14-3, 3-1.
West Virginia remains on the road to play at South Florida on Wednesday. The Bulls (10-4, 0-2) plays at Syracuse tomorrow.
