Jackets go dormant in OT, lose to Notre Dame for fourth straight defeat

Kelly also had seven rebounds in the loss, Tech’s fourth in a row. Baye Ndongo finished with 16 points and nine rebounds while Nait George dished out 11 assists to go along with nine points.

The Jackets (8-7, 1-3 ACC) had 26 points off 16 Notre Dame turnovers, but allowed four Notre Dame players to score in double figures, led by Braeden Shrewsberry’s 25.

The Fighting Irish, the second-worst team in the ACC according to the NCAA’s NET rankings, never trailed in the extra session after Julian Roper hit a 3 from the right wing to start the scoring. Notre Dame ended the night with six made free throws while Tech missed five straight field goals.

Tech now turns its attention to No. 11 Duke (12-3, 3-1 ACC). It travels there at 5 p.m. Saturday.

“Collectively as a group, coaching staff, everybody in the program, you just gotta get tired of losing. In order to stop the bleeding you just gotta get tired of losing,” Tech coach Damon Stoudamire said. “Nobody’s gonna save you, the games don’t get easier, so there’s nowhere to look. You gotta figure it out.

“We got our work cut out for us, but for me, coming here everyday trying to build days, we gotta build days.”

Tech nearly pulled out the win when it trailed by two and had the ball with less than 90 seconds to play. But an entry pass for Ndongo on the left block was quickly stolen and Notre Dame got an offensive rebound after a missed shot of its own on the other end. Markus Burton made a free throw after that, giving the Irish a 64-61 lead.

Kelly’s layup cutting left to right made it a 64-63 game with 20 seconds to go. Then, down 66-63 and with the clock quickly ticking away, Ndongo rattled in a game-tying 3 from the top of the key making it 66-66 with 5.5 seconds on the clock.

Burton had a pull-up jumper from the right side to win it in regulation, but the shot was just off the mark. The miss didn’t have any lingering effects as the Irish took total control in OT.

“Just execution, man. Like, we had shots, but it really just came down to executing the play that was called,” George said. “I feel like that really affected us down the stretch.”

Tech also found made shots hard to come by in the early going, missing 11 of 15 jumpers in the first nine minutes. Ndongo, however, scored four straight to put the Jackets up 14-13, a short spurt that included Ndongo reaching far back behind his head with his left hand to catch a lob from George before slamming it home.

The Irish kept pace thanks to the 3-ball. Notre Dame made four in the first 14 minutes, the fourth coming out of the hands of JR Konieczny to tie the game 20-all.

Tech went on a 7-0 run from there and Kelly capped the surge with his third triple of the night.

Notre Dame came right back and ended the opening period with an 11-2 run to go up 31-29. The Jackets went the final 4:19 of the half without a made field goal and got out-rebounded by six over the first 20 minutes.

Tech began the second half with five points in a row only to see Notre Dame take a 41-36 lead with 16:31 to play. Konieczny’s putback dunk gave the Irish a five-point lead and forced Stoudamire to call a timeout.

The momentary halt of momentum didn’t do the Jackets much good. A Tae Davis putback made it 43-36 and a Shrewsberry baby hook from the right block kept Tech at arm’s length at 45-39.

Kelly tried to single-handedly keep the Jackets from falling too far by the wayside. His three at the 12:17 mark sliced the score to 45-42 and his dunk, after cutting down the lane and taking a pass from Ndongo, made it 49-47 with 10:04 to play. A minute later Kelly drained his sixth 3 of the night to put the Jackets back ahead at 50-49.

After Notre Dame knotted the score at 54, Kelly came to the rescue again by taking a feed from George and burying yet another triple with 5:25 on the clock. The lead would change four times from that point until Ndongo’s 3-pointer sent the game to overtime.

Davis had a double-double of 10 and 10 for Notre Dame (7-9, 2-3 ACC) and Konieczny did as well with 10 points and 11 rebounds. The Irish also went 19 of 21 from the line while Tech went just 3 of 7.

“Winning’s hard, man. Winning’s hard,” Notre Dame coach Micah Shrewsberry said. “I came from the NBA. Actually coached in the same organization as (Stoudamire). So I know what they’re doing, how they’re playing. Sometimes when you see teams play with a new coach, sometimes you have no idea what they’re trying to do. I see what they’re trying to do, I see how they’re trying to play, I see what they’re trying to do defensively and offensively and you can see it and it’s starting to come together.”

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