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SOUTH BEND – You could see this coming. 

It was there on the horizon and getting closer out the front window as the days and the games ticked by. As January and its 65 days unfolded with so few wins and too many losses, you could see this coming. As February arrived and Notre Dame basketball still seemed stuck in neutral in Atlantic Coast Conference play, you could see this coming. 

It was bound to be this. 

One game. One final conference game. One game to decide whether Notre Dame goes home for the rest of the month or goes on to Charlotte as the 15^th and final team in the conference tournament. That’s where this season hangs for this Irish basketball team. 

Even then, even if Notre Dame does something that it hasn’t done since the first game of league play in late December– win away from home - there’s no guarantee that it will get to Charlotte. That’s where we are. That’s where this Notre Dame basketball team is. 

The Irish are here because they couldn’t do something that they’ve been unable to do all season. League play. Non-league play. It doesn’t matter. Slide even a sliver of success in front of this program, turn on the feel-good vibes and it turns its back on the slight chance that it might turn one win into two, turn opportunity into something more than something missed. 

Here we are again with Notre Dame, which did little right all night in a game against Stanford that it trailed for nearly 30 minutes. It couldn’t build off an impressive overtime win over North Carolina State, a win that left everyone around the Irish program feeling good and feeling something they haven’t felt much of in the last three seasons under head coach Micah Shrewsberry. 

That would be optimistic. That the Irish had found something. That better days were imminent. That that one league win might morph into two in a row. Maybe three. That this season of struggles was finally in the rearview. 

Instead, on an unseasonably warm, drizzly night outside, inside a cold, drafty, and empty Purcell Pavilion, it was more of the lethargic/lackluster same from this program, from this roster that, for whatever reasons, prefers to play Peter Pan. 

As in, they refuse to grow up. They prefer to stay forever young. In this league, that means forever bad. 

Unable to take a step toward Charlotte, Notre Dame (13-17; 4-13 ACC) finds itself forced to go to Boston College this weekend and win. Win, and then hop back on the charter, head back home, and pray as they’ve never prayed before that Syracuse beats Pittsburgh later that afternoon in whatever the Carrier Dome is now called. 

Syracuse does that, and Notre Dame extends its season, if only for a few days. Syracuse doesn’t do that, and Notre Dame, for the first time since conference affiliation began in 1995-96, will be forced to watch the league tournament from home. 

As painful as it was to watch Notre Dame drift through this one, where the Irish allowed Stanford to get comfortable from 3 (.522 percent), get comfortable at the rim (34 points in the paint), and play with a nice pace, it was more excruciating to sit through the post-game presser of Stanford coach Kyle Smith. 

Smith talked of how the Cardinal refused to be all happy and high about beating SMU late last week in Northern California. It was a big win. It was a statement win. From the head coach to freshman sensation Ebuka Okorie (game-high 24 points) right down the team text chain, the Cardinal talked of handling success, talked of building on that success, talked of not being satisfied with success. 

In other words, doing everything that this Notre Dame program still cannot do. 

What traits does a team that can handle success own? Smith rattled off four, each one cutting a bit deeper if you follow/believe in Irish basketball. He talked of culture. He talked of attitude. He talked of pride. He talked of work ethic. 

“We’ve got a pretty special group,” Smith said. 

Notre Dame is still woefully deficient in all. Culture? Attitude? Work ethic? Pride? All of that’s a foreign language around this Irish program that will go a full calendar year without winning consecutive league games. How is Notre Dame ever going to go and win double-digit games in the ACC when the best it can do is one in a row? A question/concern for another day. 

On a night when we needed culture and attitude, work ethic and pride, what did Notre Dame offer? 

“I thought our focus sucked. I thought our discipline sucked. I thought our awareness sucked,” Shrewsberry said. “When your back’s against the wall, you gotta come out and better than that.” 

Instead ... 

“You get what you deserve,” Shrewsberry said. 

Why? 

“I don’t know,” Shrewsberry said. “I’ve tried a bunch of different things. At some point in time, it shouldn’t matter what happened the game before. We won a game and we’ll take our foot completely off the gas. You can’t. If you want to be a good team, you’ve got to be more mature.” 

As bad as it all felt stepping back out into the soft rain early Thursday morning, a sliver of optimism remains. Win and Notre Dame just might see Charlotte. It might get in as the No. 15 seed. It might have a trick or two up its shooting sleeve. Why Notre Dame? Why not Notre Dame? 

Before answering those questions, let’s ask a third: given how this season has gone, given how this week has gone, given what’s required this weekend in Boston. 

Do you trust Notre Dame? 

To compete, to deliver, to win. 

Thought so. 

Follow South Bend Tribune and NDInsider columnist Tom Noie on X (formerly Twitter): @tnoieNDI. Contact Noie at [email protected]

This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: Notre Dame basketball needs help to get to Charlotte for ACC tournament