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Notre Dame men’s basketball hits new low in blowout loss to SMU

IMG_7504by:Jack Soble•02/19/25•

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Notre Dame head men's basketball coach Micah Shrewsberry. (Matt Cashore-Imagn Images)

After SMU took a 10-point lead less than five minutes into its game Wednesday night at Notre Dame, Micah Shrewsberry had seen enough.

Sickened by lazy turnovers, terrible defense and an overall lack of effort, Shrewsberry motioned to his bench and subbed out all five of his starters at the same time. Out went Markus Burton, Sir Mohammed, Braeden Shrewsberry, Tae Davis and Kebba Njie. To the scorer’s table went Matt Allocco, Julian Roper II, J.R. Konieczny, Garrett Sundra and Nikita Konstantynovskyi.

Shrewsberry, Notre Dame’s second-year head coach, tried to send his players a message. They did not receive it. Three days after Shrewsberry insisted his team would keep fighting, the Irish looked like they quit.

SMU dominated Notre Dame in every facet of the game, running the Irish out of their own gym by a score of 97-73. Notre Dame fell to 11-15 overall and 5-10 in the ACC, losing its fifth game in its last six tries.

This matchup meant much more to the Mustangs, who sit squarely on the NCAA Tournament bubble, than the Irish. The effort by both sides reflected that.

SMU, the No. 1 scoring team in the ACC, got whatever it wanted offensively. The Mustangs went 21 of 29 from the field in the first half, including 4 of 8 from beyond the arc. Whether they out-muscled the Irish for buckets in the paint, used simple ball screens to spring themselves open for threes or took advantage of late rotations, everything worked against Notre Dame’s lackadaisical defense.

SMU piled up 50 first-half points, 30 of which came in the paint and 10 of which came on the fast break. Notre Dame’s 8 first-half turnovers helped in that area.

Early in the game, Burton threw a lazy pass in Davis’ direction that was easily knocked away by SMU guard BJ Edwards. Edwards dished to fellow guard Kario Oquendo for an easy dunk. That play was a precursor for the demolition that would follow.

Oquendo led the Mustangs in scoring with 25 on 8-of-10 shooting. To make matters worse, SMU did this without its top scorer this season. Boopie Miller, a transfer guard from Wake Forest, was ruled out with a foot injury shortly before the game.

The biggest cheer of the night was for the Notre Dame football team, which was honored with a standing ovation at the second media timeout. The only moments in the second half that mattered also involved football players: Jaden Greathouse tried unsuccessfully to shoot a free throw with glasses that prevented him from seeing the basket, and Guerby Lambert bested Leonard Moore in a game of basketball musical chairs.

While they played mini-games during TV timeouts, SMU reached 80 before Notre Dame reached 50.

The football team looked like it wanted to be there more than the basketball team, who was 10-10 at the end of January with the chance to make the 2024-25 season anything it wanted. Instead, the Irish reached a new low.

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