SOUTH BEND, Ind. – It was a game in which Glenn & Stacey Murphy Notre Dame Head Coach Micah Shrewsberry thought the intensity lacked. Despite the fact, the Fighting Irish men’s basketball team improved to 4-0 with a 75-58 victory over North Dakota on Tuesday night inside Purcell Pavilion.
Sophomore guard Markus Burton was a bucket shy of a career-high and rebound shy of his first career double-double. Burton dropped 29 points on 13-of-20 shooting. He also tied his career high in rebounds with nine.
J.R. Konieczny came off the bench and provided a spark with 12 points on 6-of-9 shooting. Speaking of sparks, Julian Roper II gave one in the second half with his defensive play. Along with Burton, they ignited a scoring run that pushed what was a seven-point halftime lead to double-digits that kept the Fighting Hawks at bay.
Roper finished with a career-high five steals to go with four points, three rebounds and one block.
Notre Dame may have fallen short of its fourth straight game with 80+ points, but it did earn its fourth consecutive game shooting above 50 percent from the field, finishing at 51.6 percent. The Irish recorded 46 points in the paint.
HOW IT HAPPENED
Markus Burton, Nikita Konstantynovskyi, Tae Davis and J.R. Konieczny all contributed to an early 13-2 scoring run to give the home squad a 17-9 lead at 11:20. The Irish ultimately recorded a stretch in which they made 8-of-11 from the field, yet their lead was just 23-16.
In fact, by the 6:26 media timeout, the Fighting Hawks had cut it to one possession at 23-21.
Insert Markus Burton, who came back into the game and in the final six minutes secured 11 of Notre Dame’s 15 points to close out the half. Burton led all scorers with 16 points in the first 20 minutes of play.
It was a quietly efficient first half for Notre Dame. Despite going 1-of-6 from three, they still shot 59.3 percent from the floor overall (15-for-21 from two). North Dakota shot 38.7 percent from the floor and went 4-of-16 from deep to stay within seven points of the Irish at halftime at 38-31.
Kebba Njie and Julian Roper II brought the defensive intensity to start the second half. The highlight being at 16:57 when Roper recorded a series in which he got a block and then went down and got the offensive board and ultimately the layup for the score.
The Irish offense fed off this intensity and recorded a 14-3 scoring run over a four-minute stretch, garnering a 54-38 lead. Njie, Roper, Konieczny and Burton all earned buckets during the offensive flurry.
Speaking of Roper’s defensive prowess, the senior collected three more steals in the opening 10 minutes of the second half, already achieving a career-high of five.
Another great example of defense to offense came at 11:14 when Tae Davis chased down North Dakota’s Treysen Eaglestaff and slammed the ball against the glass for the block. Then he sprinted down to the other end and was rewarded with an uncontested dunk. By the 9:32 media timeout, the Irish were up 62-47.
A pair of Davis free throws and a Burton jumper out of the timeout would extend the Irish lead to 17. The two squads traded buckets from behind the arc, but layups from Konstantynovskyi and Alloco gave the Irish their largest lead of the half at 18 with the Irish in front 73-55 with 4:02 remaining.
North Dakota responded with an and-one to bring it within 15 at the 1:28 mark, but Konieczny would send home one last jumper to secure the 75-58 victory.
UP NEXT
The first weekend home game is upon us with a Friday night special against Elon at 7:30 p.m. ET on Nov. 22. To purchase tickets ahead of time, please visit FightingIrish.com.
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