Irish Sports Daily

At last year’s Notre Dame men’s basketball awards banquet a new tradition was started. Calling it “An evening with Notre Dame Basketball”, the idea was to give Irish fans a closer, more intimate experience with the team. Wednesday's second “Evening with Notre Dame basketball”, held at Purcell Pavilion, added to the new tradition when Notre Dame Monogram Club MVP, Jack Cooley, proposed to his girl friend of three years, Jackie Oberlander, at the end of his senior speech.

As surprising as the proposal was, it was not a surprise for Cooley, a first-team all-Big East selection and an Associated Press Honorable Mention All-America honoree was named the team’s most valuable player. Cooley was the second leading scorer (13.1ppg) and top rebounder (10.1) for the Irish during the 2012-13 season. The senior from Glenville, Ill led the Big East in double-doubles with 10.

Cooley was named the Big East Conference’s Most Improved Player in 2012 and this season was the only conference player to average a double-double during the league’s 18-game regular season schedule as he scored 12.4 points a game while pulling down 10.1 rebounds. The big man was part of a senior class that became the all-time winningiest in Notre Dame history. From 2009-13 the Irish won a program best 97 games.

Jack Cooley's Notre Dame basketball career ended a few games earlier than he would have liked, but the Irish big man has earned postseason national recognition for his play this season. Cooley was named an Honorable Mention All-American by the Associated Press on Monday.

Cooley was the only Big East Conference player to average a double-double during the 2012-2013 season. He scored 13.1 points and pulled-down 10.1 rebounds a game overall and 12.4 and 10.1, respectively, in 18 Big East games in his final season in an Irish uniform. Cooley also became the 53rd player in school history to score at least 1,000 points when he topped the mark this year to end with 1,017 points.

The 6'9 senior led the Fighting Irish by scoring in double figures 29 times this past season. He had 20 double figure rebounding games and 19 double-doubles. Cooley recorded a double-double in 10 of 18 Big East games this season. He finished his career with 32 double-double games.

This season marked the fifth time in the last six seasons that Notre Dame has had an AP All-American selection. The AP All-American First Team was comprised of Otto Porter of Georgetown, Indiana's Victor Oladipo, Trey Burke of Michigan, Doug McDermott of Creighton, and Gonzaga's Kelly Olynyk.

It didn't start badly, but it did not take long for it to get there. Notre Dame lost 76-58 to Iowa State Friday night in Dayton in the second round of the NCAA Basketball Tournament in a game that steadily snowballed out of control for the Fighting Irish.

The two teams felt each other out for the first several minutes. Korie Lucious hit Iowa State's first three-pointer to give the No. 10 seeded Cyclones an early 9-6 lead, but Jerian Grant answered to tie the game at 9-9 on No. 7 seed Notre Dame's first trey of the night. A 7-0 run made it 13-9 in Notre Dame's favor, but a second ISU trey ended the run and made it 13-12.

That was as close as the game would be the rest of the night on Mike Brey's 54th birthday.

Notre Dame (25-10), a team whose trademark is low turnover total, committed an unseemly 14 turnovers in the first half alone after entering the game with a tidy 11.1 turnovers per game. They turned it over on five consecutive first half possessions to help Iowa State (23-11) to an 11-1 run and a 26-19 lead. The Irish went a stretch of 7:10 without a field goal during the Cyclone run.

The 14 turnovers in the first half by the Irish ties the most in one half since Brey took over in the 2000-2001season. After going up by four points the Irish were outscored 26-10 to close the first half and trailed 35-23 after the first 20 minutes. Iowa State committed just three first half turnovers and had six by game's end, while scoring 16 points off Notre Dame's 17 total turnovers.

The Notre Dame men's basketball team knows its destination for the 2013 NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament. The Fighting Irish (25-9) will be the No. 7 seed in the West Region and is set to face No. 10 seed Iowa State (22-11) from the Big 12 in their first tournament game.

"This is a big day for our program," Irish head coach Mike Brey said shortly after learning of the selection. "Anytime you show up in that bracket on selection Sunday it means so much to this team. From my standpoint it means a lot to our basketball program."

Notre Dame's game will take place on Friday in Dayton, OH. Big Ten Tournament champ Ohio State is the West's No. 2 seed. The Buckeyes play No. 15 Iona. The winner of the Notre Dame - Iowa State game would face the Ohio State - Iona winner on Sunday. New Mexico is the No. 3 seed and plays No. 14 Harvard, while No. 6 seed Arizona faces No. 11 Belmont.

The Notre Dame-Iowa State/Ohio State-Iona winner would face the New Mexico-Harvard/Arizona Belmont winner in the Regional semifinals in the second weekend of the tournament.

Iowa State finished in fifth place in the Big 12 during the regular season. The Cyclones advanced to the Big 12 Tournament semifinals before falling 88-73 to eventual tournament champion Kansas. Notre Dame and Iowa State's only common opponents during the season were BYU and Cincinnati. The Irish beat the Bearcats twice, while the Cyclones lost their matchup 78-70 back on Nov. 23. Notre Dame and ISU both beat the Cougars.

"They've done a lot with transfers," Brey said of the job Fred Hoiberg has done as head coach at his alma mater. "They've integrated them even a little bit more than we have and it's been very, very good to them."

The Cyclones have four players who on the roster who have transferred from Division One programs. Chief among them is leading scorer Will Cyburn. The Utah transfer is averaging 15.0 points and 7.1 rebounds and has also hit 40-of-127 three-pointers (31%).