Notre Dame 69 - Akron 56 - Final

I don't want to keep beating a dead horse but Zeke Marshall is just either having a bad day or isn't quite that good.  He started the 2nd half just like he ended the first half - with a miss.  He's now 1-10.  That's criminal.

ND has pushed the lead to 9 and Akron wisely calls a timeout before the first media timeout.  This game is about to get away from them and Coach Dambrot feels it.

The Irish fans are a late arriving bunch.  The United Center know has the ND home game feeling that I expected.  I wonder what they were all doing that might have made them miss most off the first half.

Well we are almost 7 minutes into the 2nd half and Akron has put up 3 points on one made field goal.  ND might be lucky to get this kind of performance out of the way early because they are letting Akron get the shots they want.  They just can't make them.  It really is that simple.

We had a fast and furious couple of minutes where the refs were letting it go both ways.  I thought Akron was unfortunate not to get a goal tending call after cutting the lead to 5.  It's back up to 10 at the under 7 minute media timeout.

Zeke update:  Good news is that he has mad 1 of his last 2 shots.  Bad news is that he's 2-12 overall.

There's a new kid killing Akron.  His name is Brett McKnight and he doesn't pass.  He seems to be having a competition with Zeke as to who can miss more shots.  He's 3 for 12 so it's close.  Too early to call right now.  The problem with McKnight is that he started 3 for 4 so he was "feeling it".

We have our first final of the day from Chicago.

ND 69
Akron 56

Missed Shots Final

Zeke 11
McKnight 9

Every time Akron made a run, they seemed to lose Abromaitis for three pointer.  He was 3-3 from deep.

Final analysis:  It was my first time seeing Akron play and they don't play very well as a team.  They have their spurts but its not enough against a quality opponent like ND.  They played like individuals for long stretches.  Brett McKnight's play exemplified this point.  He came off the bench, hit a few shots, and became a black hole for the remainder of the game.  It's one thing to just miss good shots - that was Zeke's problem.  It's another thing to just force stuff.

I'm pretty familiar with Notre Dame and they were a bit off today.  You have to give some of the credit to Akron but some of it was them just missing open looks.  They had 16 assists on their 21 makes which is a great ratio.  They survived a scare today and that's what good teams do.  They pile up wins even when they aren't at their best.