With 5:35 left in the second half at Freedom Hall on Monday night, Notre Dame led Louisville, 73-69, in the first Big Monday of the season. Luke Harangody had just hit two free throws — bizarrely his only two of the game as it turned out — and had 28 points. Irish coach Mike Brey had to consider himself fortunate that his team had braved a withering Louisville defense to battle back from a seven-point, second-half deficit to take that four-point lead.

What Brey couldn’t have imagined, though, was that Harangody’s free throws would be the reigning Big East Player of the Year’s last points of the game and that his team would only score once more over the next 10:35 of the second half and overtime in an 87-73 loss.

I count 15 Notre Dame offensive possession over that last 10:35, with just one ending in points — Zach Hillesland’s circus finish on NDU’s first overtime possession. In a battle of strength versus strength, the Notre Dame offense ran out of gas against a relentless Louisville defense.

This is how my play-by-play descibed those 15 Notre Dame possessions:

1. Tory Jackson misses scoop, Harangody misses tip, rebound Terrence Jennings (4:46).
2. Jackson misses tough lay-in, rebound Andre McGee (3:50).
3. Harangody misses hook shot in the post, Terrence Williams rebounds (3:00).
4. Harangody misses tough fadeaway, Williams rebounds (2:03).
5. Luke Zeller misses open 3-pointer from left wing — well short — Williams (who else?) rebounds (0:51).
6. Jackson drives, makes bad pass, Harangody touches for backcourt violation (0:00.6). (The backcourt call, which was likely the wrong one, actually helped Louisville, contrary to the many protestations. Williams’ dunk, which followed his apparent steal, would have been well after the buzzer had the play been allowed to continue. With the clock stopped at .6 seconds, though, Will Scott at least had a chance for a jumper off the in-bounds that would have won the game.)
End of regulation, 71-71.
7. Hillesland scores around Clark, 73-73 (4:27).
8. Jackson throws the ball away (McGee may have tipped the pass) (3:55).
9. Harangody’s shot blocked by Jennings, Williams rebounds (3:00).
10. Ryan Ayers misses 3-pointer, rebound McGee (2:30).
11. Zeller has left-wing 3-pointer blocked by Earl Clark, rebound Williams (1:45).
12. Harangody misses 3-pointer, rebound Jennings (1:26).
13. Kyle McAlarney (we finally hear his name) misses floater, Preston Knowles rebounds (1:05).
14. Jackson misses 3-pointer, Williams rebounds (his 16th and final) (0:30).
15. Ayers misses long 3-pointer at buzzer (0:00).

In 15 possession, Notre Dame went 1-for-13 (0-for-6 on threes), grabbed one offensive rebound, committed three turnovers — all by Jackson — and attempted no foul shots. Louisville’s Williams grabbed six of those missed shots all by himself.

We expect droughts like this from teams like Louisville, who shoot a lot of threes and often miss. That kind of quick-trigger team can often go a half-dozen possession without a score. It’s the Cardinals’ offense that has let the team down in it’s three non-conference defeats.

But Notre Dame? Ken Pomeroy rated the Irish as fourth most efficient offensively in all of college basketball entering Monday’s trip to Louisville. In the game’s first 64 possessions, the Irish looked it — scoring 73 points against a stout defense. The only plausible explanation for such a cold stretch at such a crucial time from such a good offense is fatigue. No other reasoning would suffice, especially if you watched the game’s conclusion.

And who could blame the Irish for being tired?

Notre Dame’s three most important players — Harangody, McAlarney and Jackson — sat for a grand total of three minutes. Only six Irish players saw more than two minutes of action, and even Ayers played 39 minutes. It’s true, Louisville’s best players, Clark and Williams, each played 43 minutes, but no one else played more than 26. Eight Cardinals got at least 16 minutes of run on Monday, compared to the six for Notre Dame.

The other factor is the pressure. Williams flew around the floor for 43 minutes, and part of that is great conditioning, but part of it was his ability to face softer defense when he was on offense. Notre Dame players got no such respite. Jackson, especially, faced tenacious defense from several Cardinals, namely Andre McGee and Preston Knowles. The junior was forced into an uncharacteristic — and season-high — seven turnovers and missed on 4-of-11 shots.

Notre Dame’s 15 turnovers weren’t an absurd total in a 79-possession game, but, considering Notre Dame takes care of the ball as well as any team in the nation and that Louisville only had nine giveaways, 15 was a few too many.

While Jackson was having trouble holding on to the ball, his teammates saw their legs go out from under them as the jumpers stopped falling. The Irish missed their last eight 3-pointers, and McAlarney barely attempted any shots in the game’s closing minutes. Perhaps the nation’s best shooter, he tellingly attempted just one shot — a 2-point miss — in the game’s final 10 minutes. Dogged by Knowles and Jerry Smith for much of the game, McAlarney’s last basket was a driving 2-pointer with 8:51 left in the second half.

After dominating most of the game’s first 35 minutes, Harangody looked fatigued on several late shots that either wound up short or were blocked in the closing minutes. With Samardo Samuels in foul trouble and struggling to defend Harangody for most of the night, Rick Pitino was able to switch long freshman Terrence Jennings on to Harangody to great effect in the game’s crucial minutes.

Harangody, also struggling with fouls, was likewise moved off of Samuels, but neither Zeller nor Hillesland had a shot to defend him. Samuels scored eight of his team’s 12 points as Louisville went from down 71-67 with 4:15 to play to up 79-73 with 3:25 left in overtime. With Notre Dame unable to hit from deep — NDU’s last three came at the 15:48 mark of the second half — that six-point deficit was practically insurmountable. This was a game where Notre Dame dearly missed Rob Kurz, the graduated forward whose length would have given Brey defensive options. Without another body to put on Samuels, Notre Dame was helpless defensively.

Brey is clearly uncomfortable giving Jonathan Peoples, Carlton Scott or Tyrone Nash many minutes in close games. Peoples got two minutes of run but fumbled the ball away twice and was rightly removed. The lack of development from these three players forces Brey’s hand, and while keeping his best players in the game for nearly its entirety surely put Notre Dame in position to win in the closing seconds of regulation, the fact that he couldn’t get them rest also surely kept the Irish from taking advantage of the opportunity.

Depth is often overrated in basketball — a coach with seven players he trusts usually has all he needs — but Rick Pitino tries to turn his depth into a weapon using pressure defense. He knew the personnel limitations of his opponent on Monday night, and even though it took 45 minutes to fully exploit them, Pitino’s team was able to move to 3-0 in conference and put those early-season disappointments a bit further behind it. The Cards now have a chance to knock off undefeated Pittsburgh at home on Saturday evening.

For Notre Dame, it was an opportunity lost in a game that laid bare to the nation both the ample talent of this team and its unavoidable deficiencies, namely a paper-thin, top-heavy roster that is likely to struggle with the rigors of the 18-game Big East schedule. The Irish are now 3-2 in conference with their next four games against ranked opponents — at Syracuse (Jan. 17), vs. Connecticut (Jan. 24), vs. Marquette (Jan. 26) and at Pittsburgh (Jan. 31). With an RPI of 60 after Monday’s loss, if NDU can’t find a way to win two of those games, it will find itself in an unexpected fight for its NCAA Tournament life down the stretch, and it will have its invisible bench to blame for the predicament.

This story was republished at SNY.tv.