Virginia and Notre Dame first met last month, the visiting Hoos coming out on top 66-57. Since then, the two teams have been moving in markedly different directions. Virginia has remained undefeated in league play, while Notre Dame has dropped to 0-4 in the conference.
But Notre Dame has had the more difficult start to conference play, its losses coming to Duke, Virginia, North Carolina, and Virginia Tech. And as Wahoo fans know from the first matchup, the Irish are not simply going to submit to the supposed superiority of their opponents.
Nate Laszewski has been one of the best players in the conference thus far, lighting it up from beyond the arc. Laszewski has shot an astounding 57.5% from three-point land, in addition to his ability to use his size to get buckets in the post.
Virginia cannot afford to let the junior forward go unchecked again, his 28 points in the first game being the primary reason the Fighting Irish stayed in it for so long. The task of stopping him will fall mainly to Jay Huff and Sam Hauser, the latter’s defense having taken great strides since the first matchup, in which Laszewski had his way with Hauser.
The other player that helped keep things tight in the first game was Juwan Durham. He went for a totally unexpected 19 points off the bench, taking advantage of Virginia’s lack of defensive cohesion.
That issue has been largely shored up, and Durham has dropped off the radar anyway. The only other outing in which he went for double figures this year was an early game against Detroit, the 6-11 forward otherwise failing to match the production that he showed against the Hoos.
Yet while he may not be a big concern this time around, some of Notre Dame’s guards may have the potential to fill his place. The Irish guards have been decent over the course of this season, the 10 total points scored by five guards against Virginia being the low point for them.
Dane Goodwin is averaging 12 points in conference play despite his lackluster outing against Virginia, and is shooting the ball at a 53% clip from deep. He’s been a bright spot for Mike Brey shooting the ball, because his fellow guards have been underwhelming in that facet of the game, to put it mildly.
Prentiss Hubb and Cormac Ryan, two players who shot it reasonably well in nonconference play, come into this game having shot a combined 7-47 from three in the ACC this season. That’s a pretty appalling number, coming out to about 15%.
That simply won’t do against Virginia’s revamped defense, and if the Irish are to have any shot at winning the game that duo has to step it up. To be fair though, Hubb is averaging 5.5 assists per game against the ACC. He’s definitely a talented player capable of causing some damage, albeit one that has not lived up to his own standards.
To add insult to injury, junior transfer Trey Wertz is still not at full strength despite showing signs of promise early on. He returned from injury against Virginia Tech, but played just 18 minutes and went one of four from the field.
For a team that has some players currently struggling to find their game, a date with a UVA group that seems to have finally found theirs is not a welcome prospect. Granted, Virginia has yet to play an ACC team with a conference win to its name, but the Hoos have collected a string of dominant halves in recent games, something they were previously unable to do against the likes of Kent State and San Francisco.
Notre Dame is fresh off the heels of their biggest loss of the season, going down by 14 to Virginia Tech, while Virginia is finally starting to find its footing.
Kihei Clark, Sam Hauser, and Jay Huff have all been stellar recently, backed up by solid players like Trey Murphy III and Reece Beekman. The defense, too, has blossomed, holding Boston College to 49 points on 30% shooting.
This is not to say that Virginia is not susceptible to bad spells, with the eight-minute scoring drought in Saturday’s first half providing enough proof of that. But they rebounded nicely, the impressive second half ultimately presenting more positives than the bad stretch did negatives.
It’s also important that Virginia keeps moving in the right direction, because a highly-anticipated showdown with Clemson awaits on the weekend. A loss or bad performance against Notre Dame would kill the momentum that has been accumulated, whereas a win would add to it.
The way that both teams have been playing recently definitely makes a win seem like the more plausible outcome. Virginia is trending in the right direction, Notre Dame in the wrong one, and with home-court advantage the upper hand belongs to the Hoos.
Image – Virginia Athletics