The Notre Dame Men's Basketball team enters 2022 on a three game win streak and a 7-5 (6-5 vs D1 opponents) record. The Irish aren't yet out of it in a down ACC league but they'll have to make a few New Years resolutions and follow up on them in order to make the NCAA tournament. Here are four new years resolutions that will help Notre Dame to go dancing.
Get Paul Atkinson involved every night
Notre Dame has had a few significant scoring droughts this season, and there’s been a common theme during all of them. Paul Atkinson either hasn’t been on the floor or is being slightly neglected.
Atkinson is the ultimate safety blanket and while ND’s offense will probably always be guard dominant, they won’t reach their true ceiling unless they mix in Paul Atkinson like they have recently. It will require Notre Dame to go out of their way a bit, but giving Atkinson touches down low will benefit them in the long run.
To this point, Atkinson is Notre Dame's most efficient and third leading scorer.
Find another contributor off the bench
After running with a six man bench against Texas A&M Corpus Christi, Mike Brey described his bench situation by saying: “You’d love to have another guy ready, and we’re trying to do that. But none of those guys really are.”
Over the years, Brey has been notorious for his short benches and small rosters. This year only one of those things is true. For the most part the Irish have ran with a seven man rotation this season, but they do have eleven healthy scholarship players on the roster.
The seven man rotation was beneficial against Kentucky and Pittsburgh but it came back to bite the Irish in Maui when they faded down the stretch against Texas A&M. The Irish will probably be ok with playing seven for the mostpart, but when the ACC tournament (and hopefully the NCAA tournament) comes around it'll be tough to make a run with only seven players.
Notre Dame does have some young talent on their roster, but Brey and staff haven't seemed to have seen enough out of guys like Elijah Taylor and JR Konieczny to justify playing time. If one of Notre Dame's young forwards can find a way to carve out some playing time it could really help the Irish down the stretch.
Continue to Establish a Defensive Identity
All offseason, Anthony Solomon worked to improve Notre Dame as a defensive unit, and to this point it hasn't shown all that much.
Heading into Tuesday's game against Pittsburgh, Notre Dame's defense was ranked 103rd in the country by Kenpom. The Irish have improved a bit from last year, but it's tough to make the NCAA tournament when you're still not even a top 100 team on the defensive end.
The Irish have had a few spurts of high level defensive play and have really ratcheted up the pressure late in games, but they'll need to consistently get stops to go on a run in conference play.
Get Prentiss Hubb and Cormac Ryan Going
Blake Wesley's early emergence has been an encouraging sign for the Irish, but Prentiss Hubb and Cormac Ryan's early struggles have been equally as concerning.
Over the course of the 2020-21 season Prentiss Hubb and Cormac Ryan had stretches of games where they were each Notre Dame's best player. This year though, both veteran guards struggled mightily in the first few weeks of the season. Both have picked it up a bit over the last week, but to reach the NCAA tournament, Notre Dame will need a significant performance from at least one of them every game.
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