Notre Dame boys cash in at stripe

~ Notre Dame was perfect from the free-throw line in the second quarter

Notre Dame's knack for drawing fouls allowed the Bulldogs to pull away during the second quarter Saturday.

Notre Dame converted all nine of its free-throw attempts in the second quarter and cruised from there to a 63-50 victory over Berkeley during the Tiger Shootout at Central.

"It's having good form, a good routine, keep the same routine every time you shoot, and practice shooting a lot," Notre Dame junior Jacob Tolbert said is the key to successful free-throw shooting. "We practice free throws every day in practice."

The Bulldogs work on free throws for about 10 to 15 minutes each day, and that practice paid off Saturday. Notre Dame his 88 percent (15 of 17) of its free throws in the first half and finished the game at 71 percent (24 of 34).

"Everybody says it's practice, but it's confidence too," Notre Dame senior Nick Koeppel said. "You just have to know it's going in. If you're worried about it beforehand, there's a lot less chance of it going in."

Berkeley (2-4) had no answer for Tolbert, who scored 18 points in the first half, inclduing 10 points from the free-throw line.

"We wanted to establish an inside game -- throw the ball inside to Jacob and make them foul him," Notre Dame coach Kevin Roberts said. "He's a really good free-throw shooter. We wanted to attack the basket and really push the ball and get some easy buckets."

Tolbert went 10 of 11 from the line in the opening half.

"Just catch it in the post and just try to take it and go up strong," he said. "If you get fouled, you get fouled. You're just trying to finish and hopefully get an and-one. You just take it strong into a guy."

Tolbert did his work down low. He shot 73 percent (8 of 11) from the field and finished with a game-high 29 points.

"When you get him the ball, he has a knack for scoring," Roberts said. "If we could just get it to him, good things happen because defenses focus on him and other guys are going to get open shots and layups. Our key is to run through Jacob."

While Notre Dame (10-4) continued to draw contact and score at the free-throw line, Berkeley struggled to find scoring. It only managed four points in the second quarter as it shot 20 percent (2 of 10) from the floor as Notre Dame opened a 31-13 lead at the intermission.

"We were focused on stopping penetration," Koeppel said. "We knew they were quick. They didn't shoot it very well. If we just stopped them from getting inside, that was our game plan. They're going to try to drive, so you're stopping the drive. You're not even worrying about the shot."

Berkeley tried to give Notre Dame a dose of its own medicine in the second half by drawing contact. Berkeley hit 87 percent (13 of 15) of its free throws after halftime, but it was too late. Notre Dame's lead never shrunk to less than 16 points until the closing minutes of the fourth quarter when its starters were on the bench. Berkeley finished the game on a 12-1 run over the final 2 minutes to make the score respectable.

"You definitely want to stop penetration and really exaggerate your help so that they are forced to make jump shots," Roberts said. "They just didn't make them."

Berkeley 9 4 17 20 -- 50

Notre Dame 14 17 20 12 -- 63

BERKELEY (50) -- Gerald Jones 11, Leland Smith 21, Mervin Hayes 7, Tyrise Sutton 4, Stephen White 5, Lawrence Brown 2. FG 17, FT 14-17, F 22. (3-pointers: Smith 1, White 1. Fouled out: Jones)

NOTRE DAME (63) -- Liam Maher 5, Luciano Starling 7, Jacob Tolbert 29, Nick Koeppel 7, Dylan Essner 2, Ke-Ke Kellum 3, Matt Helle 9, Chris McCoy 1. FG 19, FT 24-34, F 16. (3-pointers: Maher 1. Fouled out: none)