In an absolute “got to have it” game for Notre Dame basketball Sunday night, veterans John Mooney and Rex Pflueger and John Mooney were nails in the 61-57 Fighting Irish victory.
Mooney did what Mooney does, scoring 16 and pulling down 11 boards en-route to his 19th double-double on the year.
It was Pflueger who was out of sorts in a good way who helped paved the way. The fifth year guard had a season high 18 points while shooting a perfect five-of-five from beyond the arc.
For comparison, Pflueger entered Sunday shooting all of 30% from three.
Clemson was playing without leading scorer and rebounder Aamir Simms who was dealing with the flu. They wound up being led by guards Tevin Mack and Alex Hemenway who each finished with 16.
The Tigers fell to 11-12 overall on the year and 5-8 in ACC play.
Notre Dame won their fourth straight ACC game to improve to 15-8 overall and get back to .500 and 6-6 in the league.
The difficulty scale now gets turned up for Mike Brey and Notre Dame as the Irish return to action Tuesday night in Virginia before a trip to Cameron Indoor Arena and Duke awaits Saturday.