Micah Shrewsberry apologizes to former Notre Dame players for team's performance: 'That's a a slap in their face'

The SMU Mustangs jumped on top of Notre Dame and head coach Micah Shrewsberry on Wednesday night with a 25-5 run to open the game. The Irish were never able to recover and ended up falling 97-73.

After the game, Shrewsberry was visibly frustrated with his team’s performance and went so far as to apologize to former Notre Dame players for the team’s performance, calling it a slap in their face.

“I got a chance to — [LaPhonso Ellis] was in there afterwards,” Shrewsberry said. “I told him, I said, ‘All your guys that you talk to. All these former guys that reached out to me in the last couple days, that’s a slap in their face. That ain’t Notre Dame basketball. What we’re doing now, what we have now, it all comes from what they did. And for us to not compete is a slap in their face.’”

In the game against SMU, Notre Dame got out-rebounded by 23 total rebounds and turned the ball over 12 times. That came in a game where the Fighting Irish shot 41.8 percent from the floor compared to 58.6 percent by SMU.

The loss for Notre Dame was the Irish’s fifth in their last six games. It’s dropped them to 5-10 in the ACC this season and 11-15 overall. That puts Notre Dame 14th in the current conference standings. With just five games remaining, it’s also left Shrewsberry and the Irish looking for answers.

“I apologize to all those guys that put in blood, sweat, and tears for this program. The fans that are still out there fighting for us, man, I apologize to them,” Shrewsberry said. “Because that there, that’s not Notre Dame basketball. That’s why I said, ‘This is rock bottom,’ because it ain’t gonna be like this anymore. I need five guys and all my timeouts. That’s it.”

Shrewsberry is currently in his second season at Notre Dame, going 24-35 to this point in his time there. He replaced Mike Brey, who had spent the previous 23 seasons in South Bend. During that time, he led the Irish to the NCAA Tournament 13 times. That includes two Elite Eight appearances.

Next up for Notre Dame, the Irish will play host to the Pitt Panthers. That will be the beginning of their final road trip of the season, which is going to include a difficult road test against the Clemson Tigers before returning home for the end of the regular season.