How Mike Brey has incorporated NCAA Tournament First Four’s springboard history into Notre Dame’s prep for Rutgers

Between games, practices and compiling scouting reports and during the first weekend of the 2011 NCAA Tournament, Notre Dame head coach Mike Brey caught a few glimpses of that year’s Cinderella team before it captivated the entire nation.

The No. 2 seed Irish and No. 11 VCU were in the same region and same pod in Chicago for the first two rounds, a potential Sweet 16 meeting on the horizon a week later if they both went 2-0. Brey kept his focus on first-round opponent Akron and second-round foe Florida State, but in game-day down time, he couldn’t help but notice the Rams in passing.

First, VCU rolled in from the First Four two days earlier and handed an 18-point defeat to No. 6 seed Georgetown.

Interesting, Brey and some others thought. First-round upsets are nothing new, though.

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Then the Rams hung 94 points on No. 3 seed Purdue in a win by the same margin. More eyebrows raised. Are you serious? This 23-11 team from the Colonial Athletic Association that went 1-4 in its last five regular-season games, that was widely panned as unworthy of inclusion and whose own players didn’t even watch the selection show was Sweet 16-bound.

“We were in Chicago with them when they jump-started,” Brey told reporters Tuesday. “We beat Akron, lost to Florida State. And you’re going, ‘God, they’re pretty good.’ All of a sudden, they’re in it.”

“It” being the Final Four. The Rams won two more games, sending No. 1 seed Kansas down the garbage disposal to become one of the last four standing two weeks after they were one of the last four invited.

This is all relevant to Brey 11 years later because his own team now occupies a similar position. Notre Dame was the last at-large team selected to the 2022 NCAA tournament field. It went 1-2 in its final three games before Selection Sunday and 3-3 in its last six.

The Irish really were very close to missing the field. A Texas A&M win in the SEC Tournament championship game would have kicked them to the NIT. Many bracket analysts argued the Aggies should have been in over them anyway. Notre Dame notched just two Quadrant 1 victories and was 4-9 in Quadrant 1 and 2. Its selection show gathering turned tense as Sunday dragged on. They were more relieved than elated about squeaking into the bracket.

Most final mock brackets had them out or barely in.

“When I had them at my house on Sunday, you watch all the projections,” Brey said.

All told, it’s not exactly positive momentum to take into March Madness.

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The recent results themselves — particularly the ACC Tournament quarterfinal loss to Virginia Tech — disappointed Brey. A First Four placement is a letdown considering the Irish were a projected single-digit seed as recently as two weeks ago.

The idea of bad momentum or little faith in a bubble team, though, is of no concern to Brey. Just get in and go from there. No event in sports is so steeply tied to unpredictability like March Madness. It’s called madness, after all.

After learning the assignment at the watch party, Brey handed his players printed examples of improbable runs by First Four teams once written off because of their middling résumés or because they sneaked into the field — just like VCU.

“I just want them to have a little bit of a reference point,” Brey said.

VCU has since gained company. UCLA went First Four to Final Four just last year. Syracuse reached the 2018 Sweet 16 after starting in the play-ins. So did La Salle in 2013 as a No. 13 seed and Tennessee in 2014 as an 11. All told, nine teams have advanced from the First Four to the round of 32 in the 10 tournaments since the First Four’s inception.

Brey has reiterated that history in game prep this week. The message has resonated.

“We’ve talked about kind of using this as a springboard to launch our run here,” guard Cormac Ryan said. “And we fully believe that. We think we hit the ground running and we look at it as a great opportunity for us, not a challenge.”

The first step, of course, is getting out of Dayton. Notre Dame (22-10, 15-5 ACC) must defeat Rutgers Wednesday (9:10 p.m., ET, TruTV) in a battle of No. 11 seeds to do so. The Scarlet Knights went 18-13 and 12-8 in the Big Ten, most recently losing to Iowa 84-74 March 11 in the Big Ten Tournament quarterfinals. This is both teams’ first time playing in the First Four.

The winner barely has time to celebrate. A plane to San Diego awaits to take one team to a Friday first-round matchup with No. 6 Alabama that will tip off less than 48 hours after Wednesday’s game ends.

That’s First Four life.

But it’s NCAA Tournament life too. Notre Dame’s goal was to make it there. Now it wants to author the latest First Four to who-knows-where script.

“We didn’t care how we got here,” forward Paul Atkinson Jr. said. “We wanted to get here any way possible. It is what it is. We want to go out and battle. It’s going to be tough, an extra game, but we’re here, and we’re ready and excited.”