Notre Dame Basketball: 3 takeaways from huge upset win over Kentucky

Irish defending the 3 point line

Notre Dame during the Mike Brey era has never really been known for their defense, but the Irish are trying to improve on that. The Irish were able to hold the Wildcats to 2-19 from 3-point range.

The Wildcats did get up 19 attempts on the night and the only two made from downtown came from guard Kellan Grady. The Irish defenders did a good job of getting their hands up to make sure they were contested shots. Going back to the last slide the Irish defending the three-point line and out-rebounding were two huge factors in Notre Dame coming out of this matchup with a much-needed victory.

This past offseason Mike Brey shook up his coaching staff and made some changes with it. One of those changes was bringing back assistant coach Anthony Solomon for his third stint on the Irish bench. Solomon was brought back in to help on the defensive side of the floor.

Kentucky came into Saturday averaging over 80 points per game and were held to 62 points against Notre Dame. The job that the defense did on the glass and holding Kentucky to a season-low in three-point fields goals made cannot go unnoticed. It is only one game and the Irish were 3-4 coming into the game, but maybe this can help them finish out the non-conference slate strong before heading into conference play.