By Kenneth Cross
Notre Dame forward Nate Laszewski had a career-high 28 points as the Fighting Irish slid past Radford, 79-76.
The Irish trailed the Highlanders throughout the second half until Cormac Ryan’s basket with 1:07 put the Fighting Irish ahead, 77-76. Highlanders guard Josiah Jeffers missed a layup with two seconds remaining and Notre Dame survived their opening outing of the 2022-23 season.
“It was one of those games where they’re really gifted offensively,” Brey explained of the Highlanders. “We’re going to have to score to win, we’re not going to just stop them.”
Radford built the lead to 57-48 with 10:23 remaining as Daquan Smith made a pair of free throws.
However, Trey Wertz was a huge key for the Fighting Irish with eight consecutive points in the next four minutes in cutting the Highlanders’ lead to 64-62 with 6:51 to play.
Wertz started for guard Marcus Hammond, who was out with a sprained MCL, and was a key offensively as he made 7-of-9 shots and scored 18 points.
“I got a couple of easy layups early and from there, it felt like everything fell for me tonight,” said Wertz.
The Fighting Irish utilized just six players and four of them were graduate students. Being able to complete a marathon was important as Laszewski and Dane Goodwin played 39 minutes while Cormac Ryan played for 38 minutes with Wertz logging 36 minutes.
“When it’s chaos, I think we have an advantage because of our experience, and we did,” Brey noted.
Radford took 17 more shots from the field than the Fighting Irish, but Notre Dame used it’s physicality to get to the line as the Irish made 21-of-25 free throws while RU made just 8-of-12.
Kenyon Giles led Radford with 20 points while Smith added 18 as Giles made 7-of-15 baskets with four three-pointers.
The Highlanders were picked in the bottom half of the Big South Conference, but they are clearly an underrated team with lots of athleticism and plenty of players who can shoot and playmake. The ability to take care of the ball was important as RU turned it over only six times while the Highlanders forced 10 Notre Dame miscues and scored 18 points off of those.
Radford returns just three players from a year ago and found several solid players in the transfer portal that will play together and make the Highlanders a tough out as Notre Dame and Marquette found out on Radford’s opening road trip of the season.