HoopsHD’s Jon Teitel has spent most of this month at Capital 1 Arena covering Georgetown but he decided to take a detour yesterday to check out a special game at Howard University. The MLK Classic featuring Notre Dame at Howard has been years in the making but was canceled last year due to COVID. This was the 1st road game in Notre Dame men’s basketball history at a Historically Black College and University. Jon’s photo essay is below.
There was a LONG line of students waiting outside to enter the gym 1 hour before tip-off on a cold windy day in DC: fortunately, a security guard let me cut the line so I could walk inside and pick up my credential. I could not find a “media room” with stats/food but a nice woman who worked for Fox let me take a chicken wrap/chips/chocolate chip cookie/diet Coke. The network brought everybody out to DC for this noteworthy game including a live pregame show in 1 corner of the court starring Mike Hill/Steve Lavin/Jim Jackson:
Play-by-play man Gus Johnson was supposed to have a huge homecoming (he graduated from Howard in 1990 with a degree in political science) but due to a positive COVID test he was replaced by Tim Brando. I decided to sit in the top row because there is not a bad seat inside the 2700-seat gym…and I did not want anyone breathing down my neck. As you can see by this banner, this year marks the 30th anniversary of Howard’s last NCAA tourney appearance (Greg Ostertag scored 16 PTS off the bench in a 100-67 win by Kansas in 1992):
This year also marks the 75th anniversary of Black student-athletes at Notre Dame. The Irish wore special warm-up shirts during the pregame shootaround to honor former Black student-athletes who helped create the foundation of the program. 1 of those founders was #32 Orlando Woolridge, who played in the 1978 Final 4 as a freshman and was 2nd-team All-American in 1981:
Let’s tip it off!:
The main reason this game was able to happen is the relationship between the 2 head coaches. Howard’s Kenny Blakeney was previously an assistant to Mike Brey at Delaware before Brey became head coach at Notre Dame in 2000. The crowd was so quiet in the 1st half that you could actually hear both of them yelling out instructions to their respective teams from the sideline:
1 of the best parts of any game at Howard is the band/dance team/cheerleaders who entertain the fans from start to finish:
I did not even know who Notre Dame freshman Blake Wesley was a few months ago but after seeing him listed in a couple of mock drafts as a potential lottery pick this June I was excited to see him in person. He did not disappoint in the 1st half with his amazing athleticism that allowed him to get several sweet dunks:
My earliest memory of Yale transfer Paul Atkinson was when he scored 11 PTS in a 23-PT loss to my Penn Quakers in the 2018 Ivy tourney: good times! The 6’9” big man scored 6 PTS early vs. the Bison due to his size advantage and I assumed he would keep dominating throughout but he actually went scoreless in the 2nd half:
The Irish were in control for most of the 1st half but only led 31-30 at halftime due to a late run by Howard. The star of the 2nd stanza was sophomore Steve Settle: say that 6 times fast! He looks like a string bean (6’10”, 175 pounds) but he did a little of everything: a reverse layup/&1, a turnaround jumper, a dunk, a 3, and a tip-in to set a career-high with 25 PTS:
His teammate Kyle Foster only made 43 shots from behind the arc in the last 2 seasons combined but has been on fire all season long as a SR. After making 20 threes combined in his past 4 games, he kept rolling by making 4 more on Monday and is now shooting a ridiculous 50.5% from behind the arc this year (52-103):
The Bison were able to hang around the entire afternoon due to a very sloppy performance by Notre Dame, who ended up turning the ball over 15 times. The 2 most dependable Irish ballhandlers were Dane Goodwin and Nate Laszewski, who each played 30+ minutes and only turned the ball over once. Goodwin was scoring from all over the court in the final 20 minutes including a corner 3, a baseline jumper, and a dunk:
Laszewski also stepped outside to make a pair of threes but used his 6’10” size to dominate the boards and finished with 17 PTS/13 REB:
Howard FR PG Elijah Hawkins made a layup in the final minute to cut the deficit to a single point and bring the crowd to its feet but his team could just not get over the hump and ended up losing by a score of 71-68:
Notre Dame was 4-5 just 1 month ago but now they are 11-6 and tied for 4th in the ACC with a 4-2 conference record. After the game Coach Brey said that the atmosphere inside “The Burr” was as good as that of any ACC road game, and that he decided early in the 2nd half to only play 1 big man (which is why Laszewski played 32 minutes and Atkinson only played 18):
That is a wrap, but check back next weekend as we get back on the Hoyas beat for our coverage of Villanova-Georgetown.