Notre Dame Loses Tom Abromaitis For the Season to Torn ACL

It happens every year, but it’s not something that we welcome as college hoops fan. The season-ending injury bug.

Unfortunately, it’s already hit a few places this season, and now it has struck again in South Bend, as Notre Dame has announced that senior forward Tom Abromaitis will be out for the season after tearing his ACL in practice today.

This is the kind of loss that Mike Brey and company could not afford.

Abromaitis was arguably the best player on the team, and even though the Irish went 4-0 without him to start the season, their schedule wasn’t exactly tough.

They’ve lost two straight, including a blowout loss to Missouri, and they still have matchups with Gonzaga, Maryland, and Indiana before they even hit Big East conference play at the end of December.

Everyone knew that Brey’s team would take a step back from their 27-7 performance from a year ago. But now it looks like they could struggle even more than we thought without Abromaitis on the floor for the remainder of the season.

The four-game suspension for him did allow other players to be factors scoring-wise, and players like Eric Atkins and Jerian Grant will need to produce even more on the offensive end.

But it’s hard to replace the intangibles that Abromaitis brought to the table.

He was the senior leader on this team along with Scott Martin, and the leadership effect is something that can’t be underestimated when things get tough during the stretch run of the season.

Maybe Notre Dame will still be able to make a run at a bid in the NCAA tournament, but their road just got quite a bit tougher with the loss of Abromaitis.