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Mike Brey 'honored' by experience coaching Notre Dame

IMG_6598by:Nick Kosko•03/08/23•

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(Photo by Grant Halverson/Getty Images)

Notre Dame and Mike Brey were bounced from the ACC Tournament Tuesday, 67-64 to Virginia Tech. With the loss, the Fighting Irish’s season is over and Brey’s future is a big question.

Brey said he was stepping down from Notre Dame at the end of the season. Naturally, many assumed the veteran head coach would retire, but that is not the case.

All in all, Brey said he was honored to coach at Notre Dame.

“Well, I appreciate you asking that, especially after I’m talking about refs, right,” Brey said. “Relax, fellas. We’re all good. Unbelievably honored. Been unbelievably honored. 23 years I’ve been able to be the coach at Notre Dame. It’s been a flat-out honor. My bosses are here tonight, Father John and Jack Swarbrick. They’ve been amazingly supportive.

“Even though this year didn’t go well, I’m proud of how we’ve run the program, and I think we are going to get a heck of a coach, and I’m going to help our administration recruit the next guy. To walk around for 23 years and a guy goes, hey, that’s the Notre Dame coach, man, that’s awesome. Can you make sure they say, hey, that’s the former Notre Dame coach? That would be all right if they say that.”

Brey was asked a follow up question about coaching in the ACC. Despite the league’s criticisms this year, Brey coached amongst blue bloods such as Duke and North Carolina.

“You know, I never thought in my wildest dreams that I would coach in the ACC for the University of Notre Dame,” Brey said. “That’s how crazy expansion was a couple years ago. I remember I came down here with Father John and Jack Swarbrick to Chapel Hill for the announcement and I had to introduce them to the ACC media because I knew all you dudes. I was like the liaison to the ACC. 

“To coach in this league and to win a championship in this league, and of course the thing’s playing all day on the network, and it was neat to see it, it was an honor to be part of it. I grew up watching the league as a Maryland fan in Rockville, Maryland; certainly an assistant at Duke, and great memories here in Greensboro.

“I’m really proud. You got to be part of this league, and you think back — and we won a championship in this league. I’m really proud of that. And in our second year. If Bonzie Colson doesn’t sprain his ankle in Brooklyn, we may have got two in a row. If we’d won two in the first three years, y’all would have kicked us right back out. We’d be an independent in basketball, too. We’d be dead.”

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Brey began his Notre Dame tenure in 2000-01. He finished his time with a 483-280 record at the school with 13 NCAA Tournament appearances, two Elite Eight appearances and one ACC title (after expansion in 2013-14) in 2015.