Notre Dame Basketball Is an Embarrassment: Blasted by No. 1 Duke

Notre Dame suffered its worst home loss in 128 years in Tuesday's loss to Duke

Feb 24, 2026; South Bend, Indiana, USA; Duke Blue Devils guard Cayden Boozer (2) and forward Maliq Brown (6) defend Notre Dame Fighting Irish guard Braeden Shrewsberry (11) during the first half at Purcell Pavilion at the Joyce Center. | Michael Caterina-Imagn Images

We knew going into Tuesday night that the stars would probably have to align in order for Notre Dame to keep things competitive against No. 1 Duke, but few thought it would get as bad as it did.

Duke came to South Bend and played the part of the big bad bully, doing whatever it wanted to do against the outmatched Irish for 40 minutes.

Duke started hot, jumping out to a 20-4 lead just more than six minutes into action, and things only got worse for Notre Dame as the night continued.

Cole Certa and Brady Koehler paced the Irish with 14 points each, but that was pretty much the equivalent of marking "C" on every multiple choice question on a test just to make sure you got a few right.

Notre Dame has struggled beyond belief since point guard Markus Burton went down, but that doesn't mean it should be as bad as it is. Notre Dame managed just one steal of Duke all night, while the Blue Devils took it away from the Irish 11 times.

Duke outrebounded the Irish 49-27, got to the line 38 times to Notre Dame's 19 trips, and might as well have wiped the floor with the leprechaun mascot.

The loss was Notre Dame's second worst home loss in program history, with the only one worse coming in the first official game in program history, a 64-8 loss to First Regiment of Chicago back in 1898.

Nick Shepkowski's Quick Thoughts:

There is broken and then there is whatever Notre Dame basketball is. It's hard to believe that just a decade ago, Notre Dame was annually giving the likes of Duke, North Carolina, and the rest of the ACC a run for its money.

Now its lucky if it can be competitive against one of those teams for into the final 10 minutes of a game.

At the end of 2023-24 season, it appeared Notre Dame was turning a corner under Micah Shrewsberry. It had a difficult year but rallied to win five of six games in late February and seemed to be headed in the right direction.

Since that stretch, Notre Dame has gone just 13-28 against ACC opponents.

Mind you, this isn't your father's ACC when it comes to basketball, either.

And Notre Dame's likely not even going to make a trip to the conference tournament this season, which goes to 15 of the 18 conference teams.

I don't know what the expectation for Notre Dame men's basketball should be in the modern era of college sports, but I know it should be light years ahead the disaster that has been the 2025-26 season.

And No. 1 or not, what happened against Duke on Tuesday night should simply never occur.