It took until the second round of the Notre Dame 15 Years Tournament, but we finally have a win for a higher seed. Boy, did the victors here come out with a vengeance for all the higher seeds that didn’t get out of the first round. In the only second-round matchup that was predetermined, the 2009-10 Irish led the 2011-12 Irish wire-to-wire en route to an 85-59 win.
The ’09-10 Irish jumped out to an eight-point lead just over four minutes into the game and continued to build from there. After the lead was pushed to 11 with less than six-and-a-half minutes in the first half, it never fell below double digits again. No points were scored in the game’s final minute-and-a-half, but at that point, it had been garbage time for a while.
Four ’09-10 Irish starters scored in double figures, but Luke Harangody came off the bench and led everybody with 18 points. Ben Hansbrough and Tim Abromaitis came together and scored 17 points apiece while also make seven of their team’s 12 3-pointers. Tory Jackson scored, and Tyrone Nash had 10 while coming within one rebound of a double-double.
Jerian Grant led the ’11-12 Irish with 16 points. Jack Cooley scored 13 and was two rebounds away from achieving a double-double.
Shooting percentage made the difference here as the ’09-10 Irish held a 48.3-36.4 advantage from the floor.
