With the Players Era Festival in the second year of its existence, the Notre Dame Fighting Irish received the unlucky draw of facing the Houston Cougars for the second consecutive season. Notre Dame lost to Houston once agains while at the Players Era Festival, and Fighting Irish head coach Micah Shrewsberry wants to change that, as per Joseph Duarte of The Houston Chronicle.
“I’m going to petition to never, ever, see them again,” Shrewsberry said following Notre Dame’s 66-56 loss to Houston.
Obviously Shrewsberry’s comments were more tongue-in-cheek, but it was certainly was a bit of unfortunate luck for the Fighting Irish to draw the Cougars first in the season that they ended up reaching the national championship game, and secondly when they’re trying to get back there.
With the loss, Notre Dame fell to 5-3 on the season while Houston improved to 7-1. The Fighting Irish were led by Marcus Burton’s 19 points and Jalen Haralson’s 14 points in the loss.
This is Micah Shrewsberry’s third year at the helm as head coach of Notre Dame. He was hired heading into the 2023-24 season after longtime head coach Mike Brey retired. In each of the previous two seasons, Shrewsberry has led the Fighting Irish to 13-20 and 15-18 records, respectively.
Notre Dame is trying to make it back to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2021-22. The Fighting Irish missed out on the tournament during Brey’s final season as head coach.
Prior to arriving at Notre Dame, Shrewsberry was the head coach at Penn State, leading the Nittany Lions to the NCAA Tournament in 2022-23.
