. N. C. State rebounded from a four-point loss Tuesday at Wake Forest. D. J. Funderburk added 11 points.TJ Gibbs hit three free throws and John Mooney dunked on the next possession to get Notre Dame (11-7, 1-4) within 75-73 with 17 seconds left. Daniels answered with two free throws, though, and Gibbs missed a 3 on the next possession with 7 seconds left.Freshman Dane Goodwin tied his career high with 19 points - 17 in the second half - and Mooney got his ACC-leading 10th double-double with 19 points and 16 rebounds for the Fighting Irish. Gibbs added 13 points, and D. J. Harvey scored 10.A floater down the lane by Dorn with 33 seconds left gave the Wolfpack a 37-35 halftime lead.Back-to-back 3-pointers by Bryce and Braxton Beverly put N. C. State ahead 45-39, and Notre Dame coach Mike Brey called timeout with 17:45 left. The Irish rallied to within 54-53 on seven straight points by Goodwin, but Bryce's 3-pointer made it 57-53 with 11:37 to play.The Irish got to within one again, 62-61, on Mooney's slam with 8:26 remaining. But the Wolfpack had a 7-2 run over the next 5:19 to grab a 69-63 lead.BIG PICTURENC State: The Wolfpack set season lows in field-goal percentage (37 percent) and 3-point shooting (20.7 percent) in the 71-67 loss at Wake Forest. They beat the Irish with 43.5 percent shooting, including 36.8 percent from deep.Notre Dame: Fighting Irish again endured scoring droughts at inopportune times - going 2:31 while hitting 2 of 12 in the first half, then pulling within one with 8:26 to play and going more than three minutes without a field goal.UP NEXTNC State: At Louisville on Thursday.Notre Dame: At Georgia Tech on Tuesday.---More college basketball: https://apnews.com/Collegebasketball and https://twitter.com/-Top25)
Jan 17, 2019North Carolina State didn't adjust well to a game without point guard Markell Johnson. That will be one of the goals for the No. 17 Wolfpack for Saturday afternoon's game at Notre Dame.N. C. State has lost two of its last three games and had to rally to win the game in between.Johnson didn't play Tuesday night at Wake Forest after taking a hard fall on his backside three days earlier. He didn't make the trip with the Wolfpack for that game. His status for the Notre Dame game hadn't been confirmed as of Thursday afternoon."Markell is a big part of our team," N. C. State guard CJ Bryce said. "We have to step into his place and play basketball." Saturday's assignment at the Joyce Center in South Bend, Ind., marks the second of three consecutive road games for N. C. State (14-3, 2-2 ACC).The reaction to Johnson's absence was ragged play in the 71-67 loss to Wake Forest. In a bizarre second half, N. C. State fell into a 22-point hole before rallying to tie.Then some late-game malfunctions resulted in the defeat.One issue to hit the Wolfpack was shooting. The team checked in with a season-low 37-percent rate from the field, marking the third game in a row with a new low mark.That corresponded to a season-worst point total, only the third time this season that N. C. State didn't score at least 80 points."We got a lot of shots we just didn't make," senior guard Torin Dorn said. "Shots we normally make." Without Johnson, who led the ACC in assists last season, there is going to be disruption to the offensive flow. But the Wolfpack have a deep bench that coach Kevin Keatts has turned to with regularity; nine players on the team average at least 16 minutes per game.Notre Dame (11-6, 1-3) has its own depth issues. The Fighting Irish have had to adjust to a makeshift lineup in recent games because of injuries and illnesses.The goal is to get junior guard T. J. Gibbs back to feeling good after he missed last Saturday's game with illness and then had trouble getting untracked in Tuesday night's 75-69 loss at No. 13 North Carolina."I played him 35 minutes because that really was our only option," Notre Dame coach Mike Brey said. "I thought (North Carolina) had fresh guys on him that really defended him and took him away. We need to get him back and get him 100 percent by Saturday." Gibbs averages a team-best 14.1 points per game, although junior forward John Mooney (13.7) has helped pick up the slack. Mooney is the ACC's rebounding leader with 10.4 boards per outing.Notre Dame will be in a second game this week with the opponent preferring a rapid pace. The Irish kept North Carolina's transition attack mostly under wraps, so that was an encouraging sign."I think our young group is figuring ourselves out," Brey said. "We're getting better. We're just 1-3 (in ACC play). We need to try to get another league win because they're hard to get." Notre Dame has shot only 37.7 percent in league games, but N. C. State is allowing a league-worst 80.8 points per game in its four ACC outings.--Field Level Media
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