Notre Dame Basketball: 3 takeaways from Irish blowout win over Michigan State

Notre Dame Basketball needed a big game in a huge way with the 20th-ranked Michigan State Spartans coming to town. The Irish sure got it as they controlled the game from pretty much start to finish.

Michigan State came into this matchup favored over Notre Dame Basketball. If you bet Michigan State on the spread or money line that ticket was thrown away rather quickly. The Irish led the contest for 37 of the 40 minutes. The lead got as big as 24 in this matchup.

The Irish bounced back in a huge way after their disappointing loss to Saint Bonaventure on Friday in Long Island. It is hard to believe that this was the same team that played against the Bonnies where they scored a total of 51 points. The Irish already had 42 points at halftime against Michigan State.

Michigan State had a brutal schedule to start the season playing against tough competition what seemed to be night after night. The Spartans were without key players in forward Malik Hall and guard Jaden Akins for the last few games including Wednesday night, but Tom Izzo and the players are not going to make excuses.

The Spartans just looked like a team who is hurting depth-wise with their injuries at the moment, and frankly a group worn out after a busy weekend in Portland. Notre Dame was beating them up and down the court, battling on the glass, and seemed to be getting open looks on the offensive end all night long.

Michigan State will be fine, but Wednesday night was definitely Notre Dame’s night in South Bend. The Irish needed a marquee win to add to their resume and got it against the Spartans. Here are a few takeaways from the blowout win.

3- Notre Dame played its most complete game of the year

Notre Dame was 5-1 entering Wednesday night which is great. But if you looked closely at the box scores for those five wins it was not the greatest. They had some close calls against Radford and Lipscomb and a disappointing and lackluster display against Saint Bonaventure.

The Irish knew they needed a statement win and made sure they got it against the ranked Michigan State Spartans team. They do not have the best non-conference slate this year. Marquette and Georgia still are coming up in the next few weeks, so there are still opportunities to be had moving forward but Wednesday night seemed like a must-get for Notre Dame.

Mike Brey and the players hope to win those matchups as well, but this win over Michigan State should be a very good win on the resume come March.

2- Great shooting from behind the arc, plus defending as well

Notre Dame has a lot of shooters on its roster. At the moment they are playing a six-man rotation and all are capable of being a threat from three-point range.

Wednesday night was a good shooting night for the Irish as they were able to make 11 three-point field goals, and shoot 42.3% from behind the arc. This was a lot better than when they shot 11.8% from deep in their last game on Friday.

What was more impressive was Notre Dame on the defensive end. Notre Dame was able to limit Michigan State to only four three-point field goals, and shooting just 33.3% from deep. Guard Tyson Walker ended up making half of the threes, but the Irish were able to limit guys like Joey Hauser, A.J. Hoggard, and Pierre Brooks to either one or zero on the night.

1- Cormac Ryan had himself a night

Cormac Ryan was on fire all night. If Ryan was in the famous game NBA Jam his character would have been on fire for most of the game for how well he played against Michigan State.

This was not the first time Ryan has shot it like this in an Irish uniform. Ask any Alabama basketball fans or Nate Oats about the sharpshooter in Ryan. They will remember his performance against them in the first round of the NCAA Tournament last March.

Ryan finished the game with 23 points on the night. He was on his game from the start connecting on 7 of his first 8 shots, and going 5-5 from three in the first half.

If there was one guy who needed a night like this it was probably Ryan. Of the returning players, he probably was off to the slowest start to the year. The staff and the rest of the team are hoping this can continue moving forward for Ryan.