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The Can't Miss Kid
UHND.com - Alan Tieuli - Used courtesy of IrishEyes.com
2/7/2002
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(IE) - Rutgers coach Gary Waters has revitalized New Jersey's
interest in college basketball. But he may
have been asking too much of his team Wednesday night in South Bend.
"We wanted to get the ball up
and down the floor," said Waters. "We wanted to control the tempo."
Be careful what you ask for.
Notre Dame gleefully obliged in
the 94-foot game. You could almost feel Chris Thomas' smile in the last row of the
creaky Joyce Center bleachers. You also got
the impression he could hit a jumper from up there.
Running with confidence and
stroking jumpers with precision, Thomas hit seven-of-nine three-point shots and finished
with a career high 32 points in leading Notre Dame to an easy 89-72 victory over the
Scarlet Knights in a critical Big East Conference game.
Thomas, stunningly, was directly
involved in 21 of Notre Dame's 30 baskets, hitting 10 field goals and dishing out 11
assists. It was the most enjoyable night of
basketball this season at the Joyce Center. And it was historic evening for David Graves and Matt Carroll.
The Irish have now won four
straight and stand an impressive 16-6 overall, 6-3 in the West Division. Mike
Brey's team is only
one-half game behind division co-leaders Pittsburgh and Syracuse. What's more, ND has the bright lights star in
Thomas that the NCAA Selection Committee craves.
"I can't say I'm
surprised," Brey said of Thomas' remarkable night. "He's a special one."
Rutgers had entered with a
three-game winning streak, including triumphs over Connecticut and Syracuse. The Scarlet Knights are still dangerous at 5-5 in
the division, 14-8 overall, and will be looking for Valentine's Night revenge next
Thursday at the Rutgers Athletic Center.
Graves, despite weakened with a
back injury that kept him in the campus infirmary Tuesday, came off the bench with 18
points and passed Bob Whitmore to move into ninth place on the
all-time Notre Dame scoring list. He
also had eight rebounds.
"David Graves was an absolute man tonight," said Brey. "We weren't sure he was going to play in lay-up line. He's hurting and we got to get him healthy before Georgetown (Saturday)."
Not to be outdone by his perimeter
partner and close friend, Carroll notched 14 points on six-for-10 shooting and became the
42nd Irish player to score 1,000 career points.
Ryan
Humphrey didn't score
much (eight points), but his role on this night was to rebound (14 caroms) and dish (five
assists). Notre Dame had 24 assists in its 30
field goals, a stat that tells you everything you need to know about the Irish's
cohesiveness.
"When you have 24 assists in
a college basketball game," said Brey, "that's something to be very proud
of."
Notre Dame, thought to be in
pre-season one of the weakest rebounding teams in the conference, held a commanding 46-32
lead off the glass on this night.
"We're running more and we're getting up and down
the floor well," said Brey. "But you got to rebound it if you are going to run. We are certainly going to have to rebound to win
Saturday."
It was a competitive 58-48 game
with 15 minutes to play before Thomas hit a trio of three-point baskets in five Notre Dame
possessions. That expanded the advantage to
69-53 and broke the visitors spirits.
By the time Thomas hit an
acrobatic, old-fashioned three-pointer, it was 86-59 and the white dome was rocking. It was easily the best performance any Irish point
guard has played in a Big East Conference game. It
rivaled the best efforts of David Rivers, the player Thomas was most
compared to when he enrolled.
After walk-on Dan White drilled a three-pointer for the
final points of the game, Notre Dame finished 14-for-23 on three-point field goals. Shoot the Rawlings like that and you will win 99
times out of 100.
The Irish never trailed and
led 48-40 after a honey of a first-half.
Thomas hit a three-pointer in the opening possession and had 13 by the
break. Harold Swanagan (12 points, 11 rebounds) was at
his brawny best, scoring 10, collecting six rebounds and setting killer screens. "Let's face it," said Brey. "We are
just better with Harold healthy and in the lineup."
Rutgers did forge a tie at 19 and
was within 36-34 with less than four minutes to go. But Notre Dame was too precise
offensively for the Scarlet Knights to handle.
Big East newcomers Ricky Shields and Jerome
Coleman led Rutgers with 15 apiece. Watch out for this team next week.
They have athletes all over the floor.
"We got our February focus," said Brey. "This is perfectly timed because the stakes are going up."
-0-
THE
NOTEBOOK: Barring injury or a major loss in
minutes, Graves will likely pass Kelly
Tripucka and finish
seventh on the Irish all-time scoring list. Not
bad for a kid who was only offered a walk-on role at Kentucky. The best quote on the team, Graves will be missed
by this reporter. He's the "go-to" guy for the scribes.....Carroll projects to
score another 500 points in his Notre Dame career which would also place him in the Top10
list......Radio man extraordinaire Jack
Lorri commented on
the well-preserved Rutgers coach Waters. "He's the best looking 50-year-old since I
was 50." Lorri's workout regimen on the
road with the Irish is legendary. He has guns
like Grant Irons.......You wonder if Todd Billet is rethinking his transfer to
Virginia. He would be right in his element in
Waters' up-tempo system. The Dahntay Jones transfer to Duke seems to be
working out pretty well. Usually programs
that lose players of that caliber in back-to-back years are devastated. But Rutgers, at the very least, is going to the
Big East Tournament and the NIT. That alone
makes Waters a Coach of the Year candidate......Jack Nolan had a great piece on the student
section "Leprechaun Legion" for Brey's Coaching Show this past week. Check your DirecTV listings for any potential
replays in your area. The students do a
hilarious "scouting report" on each visiting team......Quietly, Notre Dame is
now only one-game off its pace from last season. The
Irish were 17-5 after 22, 17-6 after 23......IrishEyes will be with the Irish for the
upcoming two-game trip to Georgetown (Saturday) and Rutgers (next Thursday).
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