Notre Dame basketball enters Micah Shrewsberry’s fourth season without Marcus Burton, with plenty of questions about where the offense will come from. Brady Koehler is starting to provide a convincing answer, and his latest performance suggests the sophomore could be ready to change expectations for the Fighting Irish.
The sophomore forward played 29 minutes in Notre Dame’s final preseason warm-up before the team heads to Rome for the November 1 opener against Villanova. Against DePaul, Koehler showed he could do it all. He led his team in scoring with 19 points, added 5 assists, and grabbed 4 rebounds. He also shot 50% (3-for-6) from beyond the arc.
“I thought BK was big-time,” Notre Dame basketball head coach Micah Shrewsberry said. “When he plays like that, we’re a totally different team.”
With Marcus Burton gone after being the Fighting Irish's focus in South Bend, this version of the team is Koehler’s. He’s not just the guy who could lead the team in scoring all season; he’s a leader in the locker room and off the court.
Brady Koehler and Braeden Smith emerge as Notre Dame basketball’s new one-two punch
When Koehler heard what his coach said after the game, the up-and-comer seemed to know how important it was.
“I think it’s just super motivating,” Koehler said. “In the locker room, they were talking about that same stuff. And it’s just like, knowing my whole team has a super-high standard for me, that makes me want to go harder. And I mean, felt like I did that tonight.”
Koehler could lead the front court, and Shrewsberry hopes guard Braeden Smith can lead the backcourt. One of the big issues for the Irish over the last few years is that when Burton went down or was shut down, there wasn’t an obvious second choice. Koehler and Smith could be a nice one-two punch that defies predictions for the team in Shrewsberry’s fourth season.
Smith is with his third school in five years. He started at Colgate and transferred to Gonzaga, where he played 31 games and started 17. He comes to Notre Dame this year; in his final year of eligibility, he will start again.
Against DePaul, he scored 17 points and grabbed 5 rebounds; like Koehler, he was 3-for-6 from three-point range.
Smith and Koehler both averaged just over 5 points a game as part-time starters. With both stepping into full-time starter roles this year, it's hard to know how much production they’ll really give Notre Dame. If it's closer to what they did Friday night than what they did last winter, the Fighting Irish could surprise some people in the ACC.
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