Walker Carey is an RTC correspondent.

The Notre Dame Fighting Irish are a bit of an unknown entering this season after last year’s wildly successful campaign.  Gone from last season’s 28-7 squad are Big East Player of the Year guard Ben Hansbrough, forward Tyrone Nash and forward Carleton Scott. The Irish return two starters in forwards Tim Abromaitis and Scott Martin.  Martin, who is versatile enough to play shooting guard and both forward positions, is looking to build his 2010-11 campaign where he averaged 9.9 points per game to go along with 4.9 rebounds.

Tim Abromaitis (#21) & Carleton Scott (#34) Will Be Expected to Lead the Irish This Year

Irish head coach Mike Brey believes that the time has come for Martin to light up the box score and he can do that by becoming more aggressive offensively.  “Scott has always been a great fit in our offense,” Brey said. “It is time for him to go ahead and be aggressive and be the man for us.”  Abromaitis returns for his fifth year after putting up averages of 15.3 points per game and 6.1 rebounds per game last season. He believes that he can improve on those numbers due to some facets of the game he concentrated on over the summer.  “I did a lot of work playing off the dribble, as well as refining my rebounding skills,” Abromaitis said. “I am usually looked at as a spot-up guy, but I think that can change a little bit this season.”

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***** – quit your job and divorce your wife if that’s what it takes to watch this game live
**** – best watched live, but if you must, tivo and watch it tonight as soon as you get home
*** – set your tivo but make sure you watch it later
** – set your tivo but we’ll forgive you if it stays in the queue until 2013
* – don’t waste bandwidth (yours or the tivo’s) of any kind on this game

Brian Otskey is an RTC contributor.

The first big hoops weekend of 2011 features many important games across the land. Here are five key games followed by a host of others. All rankings from RTC and all times eastern.

Cleveland State @ Butler – 7 pm Friday on ESPNU (****)

With Butler’s loss at Milwaukee on Monday, folks in the Horizon League used to the Bulldogs’ dominance are excited that this may be the year someone else takes the title. Cleveland State leads the league by a game over Detroit and Wright State while holding a one and a half game lead over Butler heading into tonight’s game. Should the Vikings win on the road tonight and plow through the rest of their Horizon schedule, expect to see Cleveland State win the league. Obviously we’re a long way off from that but CSU is currently in a nice position. Butler’s problems have been on the defensive end. The Bulldogs have given up an average of 73.6 PPG in their losses while their defensive efficiency has dropped significantly from their top five ranking of a year ago.

The Bulldogs Need Mack Back On Track Tonight, And From Now On

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