Notre Dame is coming off of two great NCAA Tournament runs in a row and is the only team in the country who has been to the last two Elite 8s. The 5-seeded Irish are fired up and looking to add to those 6 tournament wins. First up, the Ivy League Champion Princeton Tigers.

5 Notre Dame Fighting Irish vs. 12 Princeton Tigers

West Region – KeyBank Center, Buffalo, NY 

Thursday, March 16th – 12:15pm tip-off – CBS

The Resume

The Tigers are riding a 19-game winning streak, the 2nd longest active streak in the country. They ripped through the Ivy League with a 14-0 regular season and two wins in the first-ever Ivy League Tournament. Any team that runs through its conference rivals like that deserves a ton of credit and should not be taken lightly.

Though the Ivy League was a bit down this year, the Tigers’ two wins over Harvard, including a one-point victory in Boston, stand out as their most impressive. They pretty much dominated everyone else in the league. One of the few exceptions came in the Ivy League semifinal game against Penn at the Palestra, where the Tigers needed overtime to advance. There aren’t a lot of quality wins there, but Princeton did to that schedule what a very good team would do; win convincingly everywhere, (almost) everytime.

Out of conference, the resume is a bit shaky. Their two-point win at Bucknell (the 13 seed in the West Region) is by far their best and in fact their only win over a top-100 KenPom opponent all season. They played four other top-100 opponents (BYU, Cal, Monmouth, VCU) and lost to all of them by an average of 9 points. In their defense, three of those were true road games and the loss to Cal was on a neutral site. Losses to Lehigh and especially 11-20 St. Joseph’s at home are the real black marks on this resume.

Despite the lack of quality wins, Princeton is an impressive 59th overall in KenPom. For perspective’s sake, Princeton is a bit closer in efficiency margin to Notre Dame than Notre Dame is to Villanova. Overall, Princeton is sandwiched in-between Georgia, Cal, UNC Wilmington, and USC in the rankings. The “Princeton offense” is surely a phrase you’ve heard for its influence throughout basketball, but this Tigers team is more proficient on defense. KenPom rates them 46th, 12 spots better than Notre Dame. The 16th-ranked Irish offense easily bests Princeton’s (83rd), but the Tigers will almost certainly look to limit Notre Dame’s possessions with a slow tempo (336th…zzzzz).

So the resume may not be up-to-par, but the numbers suggest a team that isn’t all that far off from the Irish. And no matter which way you slice it, 19 straight wins, most by double-digits, is impressive and might be evidence of a team that is quite a bit better than the one that stumbled through non-conference in November and December. Notre Dame is around a 7-point favorite according to Vegas. 538 gives the Tigers a 25% chance of pulling off the upset, while KenPom gives them 31% odds. Take Princeton lightly at your own peril.

The Lineup

G Devin Cannady – So. – 6’1″, 185 (from Mishawaka, IN)

G Myles Stephens – So. – 6’5″, 205

F Spencer Weisz – Sr. – 6’4″, 201

F Steven Cook – Sr. – 6’5″, 200

F/C Pete Miller – Sr. – 6’11”, 230

Bench

G Amir Bell – Jr. – 6’4″, 190

F Will Gladson – Fr. – 6’10”, 255

The minutes strategy is basically the same as Notre Dame’s. Cannady, Cook, Stephens, and Weisz basically don’t come off the floor, other than for some brief breaks here and there. Those 4 played 78% of the minutes that 4 players could have possibly played in the Ivy League Tournament. I assume that is a pretty good preview of how they are likely to play things in the NCAA Tournament. Amir Bell plays, at worse, considerable 6th man minutes and often plays starter minutes. Miller and Gladson, their two real bigs, combine for maybe 25-30 minutes total, so Princeton almost never goes with two bigs and often will run without any.

The Match-up

The committee couldn’t have possibly matched Notre Dame up with a more mid-major version of itself than with Princeton. The weirdness starts with Cannady, who was Demetrius Jackson’s successor at Marian High School. Mike Brey recruited him for years but ultimately never offered, his potential scholarship instead going to Matt Farrell. Tigers head coach Mitch Henderson also grew up near South Bend and went to Culver Military Academy. Honestly, what are the chances?

But back to on-court stuff, the Tigers play quite similar to Notre Dame as well. Henderson keeps his rotations small, just like Brey, so the match-ups will pretty much be what you see at tip-off all game long. The Tigers have their own version of a Big 4, with every starter minus Miller averaging 9-10 shots per game. That gives them a lot of floor balance. Irish defenders can’t really lose focus from any of those guys or they will torch you. Expect a lot of drive-kick-shoot on both ends of the floor in this one.

Irish on Defense

Their lineup will take a similar shape, with 4-5 guards and wings on the floor at virtually all times. Their offensive style is methodical but will have a lot of motion, waiting for the best look possible, often from three. Princeton takes about 45% of their field goals from distance, which has kept me awake at night all week. A hot shooting day, and the Tigers will keep bombing away right into the second round, and there won’t be a whole lot the Irish can do about it. The Irish are a bit better shooting team percentage-wise, but that has seemingly let up lately, with some fairly mediocre games from behind the arc for Notre Dame the past month or so.

The match-ups defensively seem pretty predictable. Farrell on the shorter Cannady, and Vasturia on leading scorer Cook seem like a lock. Brey could match Pflueger on either Weisz or Stephens, but the relatively inefficient Weisz seems like a waste of Pflueger’s defensive talents. I assume Pflueger sticks on the athletic Stephens most of the time. Then, VJ Beachem can just focus on Weisz camping around the arc. Bonzie Colson will stay on the big or possibly will have to downshift out to the arc with Weisz depending on the Tigers’ lineup. My biggest concern? Farrell staying with Cannady and effectively closing out on his threes, where he shoots 42%.

Irish on Offense

On offense, things get really interesting. VJ Beachem is a unique athlete in this one. He is too big and/or athletic for anyone Princeton runs out there. I assume Stephens will be the guy Henderson calls on, but Beachem’s considerable length advantage should give him plenty opportunities over the top. I wouldn’t normally, but I actually hope Beachem doesn’t attempt too many drives, because this defense can force turnovers very well and Beachem can be a little turnover-prone in traffic. If he picks his spots and gets in a rhythm from outside, Beachem can have a massive game.

And then there is Colson. Bonzie gives fits to any defense, but Princeton seems particularly ill-suited to stop him. They have two plodding big men that probably just won’t be able to hang with Colson’s post moves or outside shooting. Then they have a handful of guys who are tall enough but lack the length or bulk to really stop him inside. Princeton’s best chance of stopping Bonzie is preventing him from getting the ball in the first place. Hopefully the ankle doesn’t hold him back because it is very easy to envision Bonzie having a big game, similar to his effort against Duke.

So much of this whole thing relies on Matt Farrell. His command of the pick-and-roll offense has far exceeded any of our expectations this season. Still, there have been times when he has been unable to deal with over-aggressive or packed-in defenses. That means Bonzie isn’t getting the ball as much as he needs, the Irish are turning the ball over more than they can afford, and/or the penetration for drive-and-kick isn’t there. How will Princeton choose to play the Irish pick-and-roll offense? Will they be able to turn Farrell over? Will Farrell be able to make them pay if they over-commit to denying Colson the ball? I really don’t know the answer to these. But I do know that the outcome of this game likely depends on Farrell’s ability to answer these questions.

The Prediction

Ah, the dreaded 5/12 game. Upset alert. Luckily, Minnesota is taking the national media beating as the 5 seed everyone expects to lose rather than the Irish. But make no mistake; this is a tough game. The Tigers guard and turn opponents over regularly. They are well-coached. They can shoot the lights out. That’s a dangerous type of team to face come tournament time. They’ll wait for you to mess something up and then pounce.

Unfortunately for the Tigers, they got matched up with the high seed that is least likely to make a mess of things. That’s not to say it can’t happen; trust me, I’ve watched Notre Dame in March enough times to know they are far from invincible come tournament time. But this Irish team is very good at staying within itself, operating its offense with a fair amount of consistency over the course of a game, and avoiding turnovers. They’ve also figured out how to guard and actually have the personnel to get out on the wings and make things more difficult for Princeton’s shooter-heavy lineup.

When I think upset, I always think the underdog needs more possessions or shot opportunities. Princeton was a +4 in turnovers in their “big games” this season (top-200 KenPom teams). That’s great, especially for a team that plays at such slow tempo. But Notre Dame is their first opponent that actually turns it over fewer times per game than the Tigers. Will Notre Dame really let that be a substantial advantage for Princeton? Where Notre Dame is susceptible more than anywhere is on the defensive glass. But Princeton is one of the worst offensive rebounding teams in the country. It’s just hard to see Princeton getting more shot opportunities than the Irish, and it’s really difficult to spring an upset that way.

Basically, Princeton needs to out-eFG% Notre Dame, and yet again, they are finally facing a team that’s better than them in that category. Bombs away and don’t look back? That’s likely going to be the strategy for the team in the field that is most reliant on threes for their offense. It’s also likely the only recipe that is going to work for them. And it can certainly work, especially if the Irish repeat their shooting performance from last Saturday night (or, to be honest, a couple of their others in recent weeks).

Make no mistake. This can absolutely happen. If Princeton gets hot early and Notre Dame struggles, even the most experienced lineup might start feeling the heat. You’d hate to be battling from behind against a team that can hit some dagger threes.

But ultimately, I just don’t see it happening. I can’t see Notre Dame getting so cold that they let a slow offense that’s good-but-not-great statistically run away from them. Even if they go cold from distance, Notre Dame has just about the best weapon in college basketball. They can always return their offense to Bonzie Colson and get buckets, even when things are at their worst. That alone is worth its weight in gold this time of year.

I don’t see the Irish running away from Princeton, either. I expect a good Notre Dame defense, led by Pflueger and Vasturia, that keeps the Tigers from really sustaining any offensive runs. But Princeton is probably too good to allow a blistering Irish offense, so it’s going to be slow, ugly, low-scoring, and ultimately close all the way through. Not quite Northeastern from two years ago scary, but pretty close. Only some late Notre Dame free throws finally create some distance and salvage the cover. Remember, there are no style points this time of year.

Notre Dame 68

Princeton 60