INSIDE THE MADNESS: Irish Vs Blue Again, Zags '99 Rewind

Notes and tidbits from around the NCAA Tournament on Friday:

NOTRE DAME UP AGAINST 50 SHADES OF BLUE

Don't expect Notre Dame to be shaken by Kentucky's Big Blue.

Actually, the color seems to suit the Fighting Irish rather well.

Notre Dame fans will be badly outnumbered on Saturday night inside Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland when the Irish face the top-seeded Wildcats, who are followed around the country each March by their devoted fans college basketball's version of Deadheads. It's nothing new to Notre Dame, which had to travel to Greensboro, North Carolina for the Atlantic Coast Conference tournament and faced Duke and North Carolina on consecutive nights.

That could give anyone the blues, but Notre Dame coach Mike Brey said the experience toughened his team:

"To go through Duke and North Carolina on Friday and Saturday night, and the atmosphere will be the same because it was all Duke blue and Carolina blue in Greensboro, and I know it will be whatever that shade of blue is out here tomorrow. I think it really has helped us, I think it's really prepared us for this atmosphere."

"And I loved in Greensboro how we just absorbed it and played fearlessly in it and we're going to have to do that tomorrow against a great team."

Tom Withers

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INSIDE THE MADNESS: Irish Vs Blue Again, Zags '99 Rewind