Written by John Brice
He had texted his coach a de facto practice plan.
Long before Cormac Ryan had set the tone Wednesday night for Notre Dame in about as big of a November game as a team can play, Ryan had set the precedent.
He would lead the Fighting Irish. He would define what and who the Fighting Irish can be, at least on this evening.
And he would lift the entire Notre Dame team in the process.
The result? Ryan scored 20 of his game-high 23 points in the first half, hitting all five of his 3-point attempts, as Notre Dame meticulously constructed a 42-24 halftime edge over No. 20 Michigan State en route to a 70-52 win in front of 7,854 fans inside Purcell Pavilion.
“(Ryan) was texting me stuff about what we should do in practice (Tuesday),” said Notre Dame head man Mike Brey. “‘Coach, we need to go compete drill. We need to go compete drill.’ I love him, I love him. It’s his ship, man. Tell me what you need, we’ll get you there.”
Igniting the Irish’s most complete performance of this season’s opening month, Ryan – along with fellow grizzled vet Dane Goodwin with a dozen points and rookie dynamo JJ Starling with 14 – reverted to the form that helped spur Notre Dame’s improbable postseason run last March and further conjured memories of some of Brey’s most dynamic leaders.
“That was Hansbrough-like, Connaughton-like; I love that,” Brey said, “when they have ownership to the point they can check in with me and go, ‘Yo, I think we need to do this today.’ I told you, we did our captain’s dinner up there at Prime Table, that’s where we go, I take them up there. Four old guys, and I just listen.
“They’ve seen it all, man. Cormac’s usually talking the most, and that’s OK.”
So explosive was Ryan – whose six triples were just one shy of his career-best mark – that he earned a reluctant new admirer.
“Cormac, he’s struggled this season but he hasn’t struggled for his career,” said Michigan State coach Tom Izzo. “We tried to tell our guys. We called him the most dangerous guy. He’s smooth, he’s efficient.
“I really, I’m a fan of his — unfortunately.”
Ryan’s first bucket was a 3-pointer that capped Notre Dame’s early 10-0 run and supplied a 10-2 lead.
After Trey Wertz and Goodwin hit consecutive 3s for the Irish, Ryan uncorked a flurry of triples that cemented Notre Dame’s command of the contest. Ryan’s long-range shot at the 10:50 mark boosted the Irish to an 19-8 edge – and they led by double figures for every moment of the game’s final 30 minutes, 50 seconds.
“I don’t know if God could have covered a few of those shots,” Izzo gushed. “Give them credit.”
Izzo said he turned to his assistant coaches on the Spartans’ bench during the game and proclaimed Ryan’s theatrics primed for ESPN.
“The one he shot from way out, maybe that will be top-1 (play),” Izzo said.
The Spartans had nine players log at least seven minutes in the contest, but Ryan never left the floor. Brey said he considered a brief substitution for the graduate-guard from the Bronx, but his assistant coaches would not allow Ryan off the floor. He was the only player for either team to play all 40 minutes.
Had Brey tried to follow through with subbing him out, the veteran coach said Ryan had carte blanche to refuse.
It wasn’t needed.
“I think he knew,” Ryan said. “I think it was pretty clear.”
Message delivered, not unlike the text Ryan sent that had already set the tone.
— ND —