Five things Notre Dame HC Micah Shrewsberry said on ‘Wake up the Echoes’

Notre Dame head men’s basketball coach Micah Shrewsberry joined the school’s “Wake up the Echoes” podcast with host Tony Simeone on Tuesday. He discussed several topics, from the changing world of college basketball to what excites him about the direction his program is heading entering his second season in South Bend.

Here’s what Shrewsberry had to say.

On what he took away from Notre Dame’s ACC Tournament win over Georgia Tech

“I thought our guys were really ready to play. They were fired up to play. We started the game playing really well, played probably 3/4 of the game pretty well. Maybe a little over half, 60 percent. But for an environment like that, for a conference tournament like that where it’s backs against the wall, season’s over if you don’t win, I thought we were ready to go. That’s a credit to our guys. A lot of teams can pack it in at that point, like fight for a little bit and then they’re like, ‘We’re done. Season’s over.’ But they were ready to go, they were ready to fight and it was great to see. I thought we played pretty well for a good amount of that game.”

On Notre Dame guard Markus Burton being named ACC Rookie of the Year and third-team All-ACC

“It was just a lot of hours that he’s put in, but also showing growth throughout the entire season. Some durability throughout the season, to be able to play the amount of minutes that he played and put up the numbers that he did. That’s a credit to not only him preparing himself for this season, but [strength coach] Greg Miskinis, [athletic trainer] Nixon [Dorvilien] that group there that really helped him stay on the court the entire season. One of the best leagues in the country, for a freshman to be third-team all-league, and we’re not at the top of the league, is pretty impressive.”

On the offseason challenges of modern-day college basketball

“Yeah, it’s a challenge now, but it’s what you sign up for, right? So you have to adapt. Those are the things that you have to do. You have to adjust to the times, even if you don’t like what’s going on currently. You go from being in constant coaching mode to now moving into GM mode, is what happens. But having guys on staff, having somebody like Brian Snow that is constantly monitoring what’s going on in the college basketball world throughout the season. You can’t be like me, where you’re just locked in on the season, then the season ends and you’re like, ‘Okay, what’s next?’ You gotta have somebody that’s constantly surveying what’s going on around the country, like, ‘What are you hearing?’

“That’s the thing, like as an old-school kind of purist, I hate the tampering that’s been going on.”

[Simeone: “Is that like a text message?”]

“Well, not really. You can’t really send a text, because it’s easy to go back and check those. But there’s a lot of different ways that people are trying to get to your players. Like, ‘Hey, if this happened,’ just putting ideas out there. Maybe it’s high school coaches, AAU coaches, people around them, whatever it may be. That’s what this has come to. You have to feel good about the relationships that you build with them throughout the recruiting period, throughout the time they’re with you, to just say, ‘Alright, there’s a better situation out there for you,’ but we did everything possible for a player while he’s here to feel good about what’s going on.”

On if that creates a dynamic where it’s harder to coach players

“Yeah, it is. Now, it’s not a challenge for me. I’m gonna coach them. When I’m talking to you and I’m talking to your parents, it’s like, ‘I’m gonna coach you and I’m gonna hold you accountable.’ At the end of the day, it’s gonna make you a better player. You might not always like it, but I’m trying to help you get better. That’s all I care about. I want to win games, and I want to make you a better player and a better person. And I’m gonna do that by holding you accountable and by coaching you. 

The best players want to be coached. You get to the next level and get experience at the next level, those guys want to be coached, so you gotta take to coaching. You gotta understand what’s trying to happen. Maybe it’s the age gap that younger guys or guys in college don’t quite understand yet, is like, ‘This guy that’s holding me accountable is trying to help me.’ Because I’ve seen what’s gonna work and what’s not gonna work when you get to the NBA. I can tell you that for a fact, ‘That ain’t gonna work.’ Or, ‘That’ll work, need more of this and less of this.’ You can take that advice and do with it what you want.”

On what excites him about Year 2 at Notre Dame

“One thing is there’s no guarantees, right? There’s no guarantees that Year 2’s gonna be any better than Year 1. It should be. It should be. But there’s no guarantees, so we have to work for it. Gotta work the same exact way, but we gotta work even harder than we did, because it’s not like we’re gonna sneak up on you. Clemson’s like, ‘Hey, you’re not getting us again. We fell for the trap last time.’ There is no sneaking up on anyone, so we gotta prepare better, we gotta be better as a group and we gotta be hungry.

“But the one thing that I talk to our guys about, and this is something to be excited about. There’s still a long way until May whatever, and the transfer portal is still open. Somebody can still fly out of it, right? You never know what’s gonna happen. But I talk to our guys about continuity. Who can make a jump from one year to the next? The teams that have done it, they have some continuity. We talked about, obviously, after we played the Marquette game. Their continuity has been huge. They haven’t lost people. They’ve been able to really build up toward these moments, having a really good team after — this is probably Year 3 of those guys together.

“You look at some of these other programs that are having success, continuity is the key. If we can keep this group together, keep adding key pieces that supplement this group, that make each other better, we can keep making jumps. We can keep getting better. So I’m excited to have a group back. I’m excited to go into practice and say something and people know what I’m talking about. That’s gonna be so much fun, to say a drill and everybody can just go to a place and know what we’re doing. Continuity is king in college basketball.”