Less than a month ago, the Notre Dame Fighting Irish had won seven straight, their 16-2 record had them high in the national rankings and their 5-0 ACC record led the conference.
That was before a spate of five losses (and just two wins) dropped the Irish out of the Top 25 and down in the conference standings. The Irish lost to Florida State, Virginia, Georgia Tech, Duke and North Carolina, while defeating just Syracuse and Wake Forest.
Saturday may have been the start of what could be called the Irish Revenge Tour as Notre Dame hosted #14 Florida State and handed them an 84-72 defeat at South Bend.
Leading the charge was junior forward Bonzie Colson, who hung a career-high 33 points on the Seminoles and improved his conference-best double-double tally to 16 with 13 rebounds.
The win moved Notre Dame to 8-5 in conference play, tied with Syracuse in fifth place, but only 1 1/2 games behind ACC leader, North Carolina.
Colson, a 6'5" match-up nightmare out of Detroit, made 12 of 18 shots from the field including a three-pointer and was a perfect 8-for-8 from the charity stripe.
With the win, the Fighting Irish may have turned their season back into a sure invite to the NCAA tournament. At 19-7, the Irish have an excellent shot at being one of the six or seven teams out of the ACC to go to the big dance, They have games remaining against Louisville, Georgia Tech, Boston College (twice, home and away) and NC State prior to the ACC tournament.
