Needless to say, the first two seasons of the Micah Shrewsberry tenure in South Bend have fallen wildly short of the expectations at a place like Notre Dame, for a marquee sport like Men’s Basketball. However, there is room for extreme optimism heading into the 2025-2026 season for multiple reasons that we will break down here.
- Micah Shrewsberry is still one of the best X and O coaches in the country, and he didn’t forget how to coach. Following extremely successful stints in the NBA and with Purdue, Shrewsberry took Penn State to the Round of 32 before taking over at Notre Dame two seasons ago. Without pulling any punches, the talent since Shrewsberry has arrived on campus just hasn’t been Top end ACC good. We all know that no matter how good you are with your X’s and O’s it will ALWAYS be about the Jimmy’s and Joes.
- Experience and continuity will be High —- In the modern era of College Basketball, most teams are meeting 90% of their roster at the beginning of the Summer. At that point the staff has to teach scheme, philosophy, and culture, while also getting the team to mesh as a unit. This is almost impossible to do in a single off-season, so the fact that the majority of the key contributors are coming back is a major plus, despite the relative lack of success the last few seasons. Shrewsberry is known for running a complex offensive system based on reading the defense and reacting, and being a part of his system for multiple years will only help this group.
- They have a true ACC Player of the Year candidate who will most likely lead the league in scoring. Markus Burton averaged 21.3 PPG last season which ranked 5th nationally, and he averaged 23.5 PPG in ACC play which led the whole conference. The 5’11 playmaking Junior will look to continue to round out his game this season, and now has the experience to lead his team to some big wins. Missing 7 games with a knee injury last season also really hurt his rhythm, so a healthy season should only help the team’s success as a whole. Pairing Burton with Braedon Shrewsberry, Micah’s son, and an experienced talent in his own right, the backcourt is set to have a huge season.
- The Irish did a great job with their recruiting class – Adding talent was something that was obviously needed to compete at the top end of the league. The Coaching Staff did a great job of not only recruiting high level high school players, but also filling specific needs within the talent they recruited. The Freshman that are coming in were all highly regarded and in the Top 150 nationally. First, Jalen Haralson was a Mcdonalds All American and considered one of the best players in the country. He could have gone to multiple Blue Blood programs that were recruiting him heavily, but he believed in the vision of Shrewsberry and his staff and stayed home. The other Freshmen, Ryder Frost, Tommy Ahneman, and Brady Koehler were all also heavily recruited at the High Major Level and should find opportunities to contribute early as well.
- Without the influx of Transfers that most programs had out of the program, their was slightly less of a need for the staff to bring in a big Transfer Portal Class. They were able to reel in one BIG Fish that happened to lead all of Division 1 Basketball in Rebounding a Season ago. Carson Towt averaged a mind blowing 12.3 Rebounds a game at Northern Arizona and recorded over 400 Total Rebounds. Notre Dame beat out schools like St Marys, Baylor, and Xavier for Towt who is now entering his 7th season in College. A really quality piece added with size, experience, and one major translatable skill.
All in all, experience, talent, and experienced talent will all be enhanced this season at Notre Dame. Coach Shrewsberry has been able to retain his key pieces, add new pieces that are extremely talented, and get his culture and values all the way implemented over the course of the last two seasons. There is no question that Notre Dame will be improved from the last two seasons. The big question is, does this team have what it takes to get to the Big Dance and do damage? We are excited to see it all play out.
