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Newsstand: Notre Dame men's basketball debuts on bubble in ESPN bracketology

IMG_7504by:Jack Soble•04/30/25•

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shrewsberry burton
Notre Dame head men's basketball coach Micah Shrewsberry (left) and guard Markus Burton (right). (Matt Cashore-Imagn Images)

Can Notre Dame men’s basketball rise to NCAA Tournament contention in head coach Micah Shrewsberry’s third season? ESPN bracketologist Joe Lunardi believes it’s possible.

In his first edition of the projected 2025-26 bracket — a way-too-early edition, of course — Lunardi put the Irish in his “next four out.” Notre Dame would finish seventh out of 18 teams in the Atlantic Coast Conference in his projection, with five ACC teams (Duke, Louisville, North Carolina, Miami and North Carolina State) in the tournament and one more (SMU) as his last team out.

The Irish finished 12th in the ACC this past season, limping to a 15-18 (8-12 ACC) record.

Lunardi is counting on Notre Dame’s returning production — primarily junior guards Markus Burton and Braeden Shrewsberry — to mesh well with a promising freshman class led by top-25 forward Jalen Haralson. A significant step forward is necessary to get Shrewsberry’s program on the right track.

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Quote of the day

“To see somebody like Jack Kiser opt into playing a position like safety, when he is in fact an inside linebacker, when that could make him look worse than he would like but was productive in that setting. … These are guys that love the game of football, regardless of if it might put them in a compromising position in the eyes of evaluators and decision-makers by playing too many snaps or playing out of position. These guys love ball, and that’s what we’re hunting up.”

— Jacksonville Jaguars general manager James Gladstone, who selected Kiser in the fourth round (No. 107 overall) on Saturday

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