The Shrewsberry Era Has Arrived

SOUTH BEND, Ind. – The wait is officially over. A new era is finally upon Notre Dame men’s hoops. For the first time in over 8,000 days, a new head coach will be patrolling the Irish sidelines. On Monday night inside Purcell Pavilion, Glenn & Stacey Murphy Head Coach Micah Shrewsberry will walk out with his new-look Irish squad.

Notre Dame will host Niagara in its season opener, tipping off at 7 p.m. ET and streaming live on ACCNX. Tickets are still available and can be purchased online by clicking here.

The first 3,000 Irish fans in attendance will receive a ‘Shrews Crew’ green rally towel. The first 1,000 Notre Dame students will receive a Lep Legion Irish Men’s Hoops shirt.

SHREWSBERRY ERA

Micah Shrewsberry became the 18th head coach in Irish men’s basketball history, returning to his home state of Indiana (grew up outside of Indianapolis). He arrived in South Bend off of a historic turnaround at Penn State, where in year two, the Nittany Lions produced a 23-14 mark, just the 12th 20-win season in the 127-year history of the program.

How about this stat – Shrewsberry collected more Big Ten wins (17) in his first two seasons than any other Penn State head coach in program history.

It’s also about ending the season playing your best basketball and Micah’s Penn State squad did just that. The Nittany Lions became just the third double-digit seed to reach the Big Ten Tournament championship game. Then Penn State made its first NCAA Tournament appearance since 2011 and later won its first Tourney game since 2001, defeating Texas A&M.

All-in-all, Shrews has coached in six NCAA Tournaments, two NCAA Final Fours, five NBA Playoffs and two NBA Conference Finals.

SEASON OPENER NOTABLES

Historically, the Irish are 99-21 (.825) in their season openers. In addition, the program is 109-11 (.908) in home openers.

The last time Notre Dame dropped a season opener at home – you’d have to go all the way back to the 1998-99 season, when the Irish fell 76-65 to Miami (Ohio).

WHAT TO WATCH FOR

Ironically enough about that Nov. 13, 1998, game against Miami (Ohio) – that was the last time Notre Dame started two freshmen in a season opener. Irish fans will most likely see that occurring for the first time in a quarter of a century on Monday with Shrews’ highly talented freshmen foursome at his disposal.

In terms of notable debuts:

• LaPhonso Ellis holds the top spot with 27 points in his 1988 freshman debut.
• Chris Thomas has the most historic freshman debut in program history, netting a triple-double with 24 points, 11 steals and 11 assists
• The only other 20+ point freshman debut in the past three decades – Blake Wesley, 21 points in 2021-22.
• Coaching-wise – who had the biggest team point total in their debut –Mike Brey in his 104-58 win over Sacred Heart. The two behind him — Clem F. Crowe (W, 89-28) and Edward ‘Moose’ Karuse (W, 86-38).

FRESHMAN FOUNDATION

A little over a month into the job, Coach Shrewsberry had himself a top-25 ranked incoming freshmen class – Carey Booth, Logan Imes and Braeden Shrewsberry – all flipped from their Penn State commits. Then add in Mr. Indiana Basketball Markus Burton, who kept his commitment to Notre Dame. That brought the 2023 class to four signees which ranked 23rd in the country according to 247Sports.com.

Furthermore, cementing the bond among the freshmen class, there was an Indiana connection among most of them:

— Imes and Shrewsberry played together throughout all four of their high school years with the Indiana Elite.

— Imes and Burton were teammates on the 2023 Indiana All-Stars squad

CLEAN SLATE

Notre Dame only returns 35 points from a season ago, which equates to 1.6% of scoring returning. The table on the bottom of this page displays the Division I schools returning the least amount of points ahead of the 2023-24 season.

MR INDIANA

On April 20, 2023, now freshman point guard Markus Burton, was named Mr. Indiana Basketball. It marked the third time in program history in which a future Notre Dame player took home the honor. The two former winners were Chris Thomas in 2001 and Luke Zeller in 2005.

Burton averaged a state-best 30.3 points per game, along with 5.7 rebounds, 5.1 assists and 3.6 steals. Burton also secured the school single-season scoring record by pouring in 909 points as a senior.

NEW ARRIVALS

Julian Roper II – Northwestern – junior from Detroit. Played in 44 games for the Wildcats with 15 starts

Tae Davis – Seton Hall – sophomore from Indianapolis. Played in 32 games as a true freshman

Kebba Njie – Penn State – sophomore from Centerville, Ohio. Played in all 37 games for Shrewsberry last season, including 26 starts. He’s also the only player on the current roster who has played under Coach Shrewsberry ahead of this season

EXHIBITION WIN

Irish fans were treated to a dominant 96-62 win over D-III opponent Hanover College.

“I wanted to see our guys play hard and compete, just like in practice,” Coach Shrewsberry said. “I wanted people to come here and see us compete like that and play like that and know it’s going to be like that every single game. We might not come out on top, but we are going to compete every single game. I thought those guys poured their hearts out. I said empty your tank and let the next guy come in and do the same thing.”

What’s exciting about the Shrewsberry era is that three freshmen balled out tonight in their debut. Mr. Indiana Basketball, Markus Burton, led the way with 18 points. Then fellow freshmen Braeden Shrewsberry and Logan Imes followed suit with 14 points.

Other double-digit point scorers included J.R. Konieczny and Matt Zona with 12 points each.

Notre Dame recorded a 24-0 scoring spree which spanned from 13:06 to 7:46. Markus Burton tallied exactly of the team’s points in said run with 12. Another first-half highlight was Braeden Shrewsberry knocking down three triples in less than a two-minute span. All-in-all, both Burton and Shrewsberry finished the half with 14 points each. Imes got his double-digit points early in the second half though, knocking down back-to-back triples around the 16-minute mark.

— ND —