Box Score
SOUTH EUCLID, Ohio -- The Notre Dame Falcons used a big second half and a great defensive effort to pull off a major upset on Saturday afternoon, defeating Shepherd, 82-77 at Murphy Gymnasium.

The victory for the Falcons (4-7, 2-3 MEC) was their second in a row at home, and their first since Dec. 14, while the loss for the Rams (9-2, 4-1) was their first in conference play. 

The game featured two of the MEC's top three scoring offenses, but the game proved to be defensive struggle, especially in the first half. 

Shepherd flexed some defensive muscle in the early goings, as they used a big 3-pointer from Brantley Osborne to trigger a 12-3 run over the first six minutes of the contest, before the Falcons came roaring back. 

Notre Dame responded over the next four minutes, going on a 10-0 run during that stretch, which was capped by Connor Deckard's layup at the 10:04-mark to give the Falcons a 13-12 advantage. 

Both sides traded blows through the rest of the first half, with neither team able to take an advantage any bigger than five.  Notre Dame led, 29-24, and closed out the first half with a 29-28 lead.  The two teams had trouble filling it up in the opening half, as the Falcons shot 30.0-percent (9-for-30) from the floor, and the Rams hit on just 30.6-percent (11) of their 36 shots in the opening stanza. 

Jarvis Huntley had a huge first half for Notre Dame with 15 points, getting  a third of those from the charity stripe, where he sank 5-of-6 (83.3-percent) shots. 

Kalomo Figueroa-Jackson had just one point in the opening half, but grabbed 11 rebounds, and would prove to be a major catalyst later on, as he caught fire from beyond the arc.

The Falcons were 0-for-10 from 3-point land in the first half, but Figueroa-Jackson brought them out of that slump when he hit his first of three 3-pointers just over a minute into the second half to give Notre Dame a 34-30 advantage. 

Notre Dame led by eight early on in the second half (40-32) before 3-pointers from both Osborne and Austin Cunningham brought them back within two. Osborne struck again with another 3-pointer with 11:04 remaining to make it 53-51, NDC, before Notre Dame went on a big run.

Lawrence DeArmond scored the  next seven points of the contest to kick-start an 11-0 NDC run, as the Falcons took a 64-51 advantage with just under seven minutes to play.

From that point forward, the Falcons maintained control, and never led by any less than eight, until the final 10 seconds of the contest as NDC pulled away. 

Huntley led the Falcons offensively with 23 points and added a trio of assists.  DeArmond scored 19 points and added eight rebounds, while Figueroa-Jackson scored 17 of his 18 points in the second half, and came away with a double-double, adding 12 rebounds.  Tyree Gaiter had 11 points and seven rebounds.

The Falcons are in action again on Monday, Jan. 6, when they play host to Fairmont State at Murphy Gymnasium.  Tipoff is scheduled for 7:30 p.m.