NEW YORK - Despite a 14-point effort from junior center Hamady Ndiaye (Dakar Senegal), No. 15 seed Rutgers (11-21) dropped a 61-50 decision to 10th seeded Notre Dame (18-13) Tuesday evening in the opening round of the BIG EAST Championship at Madison Square Garden. Freshman guard Mike Rosario (Jersey City, N.J.) registered 12 points against the Irish to increase his tally to 517, surpassing Phil Sellers (1972-73; 506) for the most points scored by a Scarlet Knight freshman in a season.
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Hamady Ndiaye was 6-for-7 from the field, scoring a team-high 14 points. (Tom Ciszek/NJSportsPhoto) PHOTO GALLERY
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Rutgers jumped out to an 11-6 lead before ND went on a 12-2 run to take an 18-13 advantage with 7:08 remaining before the break. RU reduced the deficit to a single digit before the Irish scored 10 of the first half’s final 12 points to take a 28-19 lead into the locker room.
After the midpoint, the Scarlet Knights scored 13 of the initial 18 points. Trailing 33-32 after an Earl Pettis (Philadelphia, Pa.) three-pointer with 15:24 on the clock, the Irish answered with a 12 point run and Rutgers, struggling to find its shot, would not recover. RU would get to within five (55-50) on a Corey Chandler (Newark, N.J.) fast break field goal with 1:09 remaining, but would get no closer.
Gregory Echenique (Guatire, Venezuela) and Chandler paced the Scarlet Knights on the glass, with eight rebounds each.
Tory Jackson scored 12 points, all in the second half, to lead three Notre Dame players in double figures. Kyle McAlarney added 11 points for the Fighting Irish, who will play seventh-seeded West Virginia in a second round match-up Wednesday evening.
POSTGAME NOTES
- Rutgers had its season come to an end with a 61-50 loss to Notre Dame in the 2009 BIG EAST Championship at Madison Square Garden. The loss snapped Rutgers’ two-game winning streak in BIG EAST Championship first round games.
- Rutgers is now 5-10 all-time in the BIG EAST Championship, including a 1-2 mark vs. the Irish.
- Mike Rosario passed Phil Sellers as the school’s all-time leading scorer as a freshman with 517 points this season. Sellers held the record by scoring 506 points as a freshman during the 1972-73 season. Sellers holds the school’s all-time record with 2,399 career points. Rosario finished the game with 12 points.
- Rosario ended the season with his team-best 28th game in double-figures.
- Hamady Ndiaye led RU with 14 points. He was 6-for-7 from the field as he led RU in scoring for the second time in his career. It marked Ndiaye’s best scoring output since he posted 26 points at Delaware on November 16, 2008.
- Rutgers dominated play in the paint, outscoring the Irish 28-14. Rutgers held a 10-4 advantage in second chance points as well vs. the Irish.
- Three Rutgers seniors played their final game Tuesday night at MSG. Anthony Farmer scored six points to close out his career with 1,092 points, while adding three assists (371 career). J.R. Inman had two points (1,060 career) and three rebounds (688 career), while Jaron Griffin shot one-of-one to score two points in his final career game.
- Farmer tied his career-high in rebounds, grabbing seven boards against the Irish. Corey Chandler also tied his career-high on the glass, grabbing eight rebounds.
POSTGAME QUOTES
Q. Obviously you played well defensively but offensively did you get shots you wanted or what do you think happened?
COACH FRED HILL: I think you saw a microcosm of the season. The shots we wanted, we missed layups, wide open looks, 12, 15-foot pull ups. Offensive rebounds.
We did a terrific job on the glass, had 14 offensive rebounds and didn't score. You get an offensive rebound and two feet from the basket you've got to lay that back in. If you can't, you can kick it out and get another wide open look usually from 3. That's also a microcosm of where we are.
I have to commend our defensive effort and I have the utmost respect for Luke Harangody. He is reigning Big East Player of the Year or was coming into the season. I'm sure there was a new one today. Great player. You guys will know better today. He probably averages in the mid 20s. I wanted to kill Chris Carton on the radio show. He told me coming to this game today that (Luke) Harangody shot 30 percent against us the last two years and goes 3 for 17 tonight.
Just a phenomenal job on the defensive end. We have to become a better offensive team. We've got to shoot the ball better. We've got to be more consistent in our decision-making and we've got to get a little better with our ball handling. I thought tonight we did a good job. Didn't turn the ball over.
Couple key ones when we were down 3 but we did a pretty solid job of not doing that. When you get open shots, you got to knock them down if you want to give yourself a chance to win. We certainly give ourselves a chance to win on the defensive end every night out.
Q. Just for anybody, it seems like you guys outhustled Notre Dame. It seems like you did everything right energy-wise but the shots wasn't there.
Does it make the loss especially tough to take?
COACH FRED HILL: Every loss is tough to take. Certainly when do you those things like we talked about, we've talked about it all year long with these guys, getting rewarded for what they do.
Guys, make no mistake, it when you don't win games you don't get rewarded. It's hard to come out and defend and play with energy especially when you don't score on the offensive end. This game is about scoring. You catch guys score and there's a pep in their step. They run back on the defensive end with a little more energy. We don't score when we do that, do it pretty darn well.
So it's very frustrating when you miss easy shots. You know, someone asked, did we get the great shots? We took some bad shots but few, a few bad shots. We took good shots and got good shots and, you know, execution is getting good shots and then you got to make and it's very frustrating when your teammate sets a great screen for you and gets a great look.
We set a good ball screen and get a jumper and it doesn't go down. Yeah, that's very frustrating but it shows me we're doing the right things and we just got to get guys that are a little better. That's what we just talked about. It's time just to become efficient and consistent and we need to get better on the offensive end.
Q. Hadamy, what is it about playing against Harangody; you've had a lot of success against him in the past and tonight?
HAMADY NDIAYE: Well, I also always come on the court and give it my best whoever I'm playing. Tonight, was something different for me because this was my first chance to get in the Big East and I've been waiting for this chance for three years now so I think it doesn't really matter if it was Harangody or whoever else, I came out today and did not expect to leave and I was not ready to leave tonight. I really wanted to win.
This is my first chance so that's maybe why I pretty much gave it my best when I was on the defensive end and also knowing that for the past two years, every time we played against Harangody. I had a pretty much good game against him playing defense which is one of the things I do best.
Q. Y'all had a really tough shooting effort in the first half. Do you think that you were a little bit wooed by the Garden?
ANTHONY FARMER: No, not at all. We played here earlier. I played here before. I love the arena. That didn't have any effect on us.
Q. Anthony, Coach talked about how this game is a make for the year. How has the year been? People said there were good things this year.
ANTHONY FARMER: Yeah. Take nothing away from it. The time I spent, you know, with the guys I love the most, my other family, away from home if nothing else, but definitely, you know, it was, you know, rollercoaster ride but, you know, you're judged on how you bounce back, you know, how you fight adversity, you know, and that's how good character is measured.
Q. Your coach talked about how it's hard to find that effort when he you're not getting rewarded with wins. Where did you guys come up with that?
ANTHONY FARMER: Bunch of competitors. We love to compete and this is a game we love the most so regardless, you know, you love this game and you respect this game. When you step on that floor you have to compete.
Q. Fred is Mike okay?
COACH FRED HILL: Yeah. I didn't actually see him. From what the trainer said obviously went flying into the stands there and banged his head.
