Notre Dame has no room for error if it wants to pull off a surprise and receive an invite to March Madness. That will be a tall order without winning the ACC tournament, especially in a down year for the conference. The strive towards perfection the rest of the way begins Sunday against Miami. Not saying the chances of this scenario playing out are very good, but crazier things have happened.
After a thrilling last-second win over North Carolina, the Irish (16-10, 7-8) will look to build that momentum against the Hurricanes (14-12, 6-10), who have four of the programs’ past five meetings. Notre Dame has won only two of the seven matchups since the programs became ACC rivals.
The Irish on pace to lead their conference in fewest fouls committed for the ninth time in the past 10 times, but if the season ended today, their 12.5 fouls a game would be well ahead of the 13.1 average they accumulated during the 2017-18 season. In short, Mike Brey’s team has exceeded its reputation in one of the areas it has excelled in for the past decade.