Notre Dame Basketball: Irish Ride Beachem’s Hot Shooting to a Victory Over Michigan

Thanks to the hot shooting from V.J. Beachem the Irish stormed back in the second half to take down Michigan in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.

It looked to be the same old story for Notre Dame basketball in the first half of their first round game against Michigan, turnovers and missed shots. The way the Irish played in the first half it looked like  they were bound for another first round exit. Nothing went right for the Irish in the first half as they went in to the locker room trailing 41-29.

Mike Brey and his staff made a few halftime adjustments and the Irish came out firing in the second half. Notre Dame started the second half on a 8-0 run to cut Michigan’s lead to 4. Steve Vasturia sparked the run with a layup and a three-pointer. The Irish would eventually tie the game at 48 and the game would go back and forth the rest of the way. Junior guard V.J. Beachem stole the show in the second half as he came up with big shot after big shot for the Irish. His biggest shot of the game came at the 3:45 mark with the game tied at 59, he knocked down a deep three-pointer to gave the Irish the lead for good. Beachem finished the game with 18 points and was a perfect 7-7 from the field and 4-4 from three-point land.

The Irish got big contributions off the bench from Bonzie Colson and Rex Pflueger. Colson came up with some big rebounds late in the game that led to Irish points. He finished with 12 points and 5 rebounds. Pflueger’s contributions came mostly on the defensive end. He came in and played locked down defense on some of Michigan’s best guards. Pflueger also took a huge charge late in the second half that could have flipped momentum if it was called the other way.

Demetrius Jackson played a much better game as he tallied 11 points on 4-8 shooting. Aside from an airball in the first half, his shot looked much better and he could be coming out of his shooting slump at the right time.

Zach Auguste chalked up another double-double with 10 points and 12 rebounds. He also had 3 blocks. Auguste didn’t see much time late in the game as Brey chose to go with a much smaller and quicker lineup with Colson playing the five.

The Irish will turn around and take on upset minded Stephen F. Austin on Sunday afternoon. The 14 seed Lumberjacks knocked off 3 seed West Virginia 70-56 on Friday night. Notre Dame will have to come up with an answer for SFA’s best player Thomas Walkup, who scored 33 points in his team’s win over WVU. Tip-off is scheduled for 2:45 p.m. ET on Sunday.