SPOKANE, Wash. -- Winthrop has a simple team motto, so simple it's a wonder more teams don't champion it.
"Need 'dat."
"We're always on the court going, 'C'mon now. Need 'dat'," senior Torrell Martin said, spelling out "d-a-t."
Need fulfilled.
Craig Bradshaw scored 24 points and the constantly moving Martin added 20 points with a career-high 11 rebounds. They led the 11th-seeded Eagles from the unheralded Big South Conference to their first NCAA Tournament win in seven tries, 74-64 over No. 6 seed Notre Dame in the first round of the Midwest Regional.
"We've been trying to get this for the last three years," Bradshaw said in his native New Zealand accent.
"This" is a second-round date with Oregon on Sunday.
Winthrop (29-4), the little school from Rock Hill, S.C., lost in the final seconds to Tennessee last year in the NCAAs. And the March before that, after leading heavily favored Gonzaga, the Eagles fell.
Yet they came from those crushing defeats -- and a frenetic Irish rally in this game -- to advance.
They blew all of their 20-point lead in the second half before surging in the final two minutes to end Notre Dame's first NCAA appearance since 2003.
When the elusive win finally came, Winthrop players leaped up and down as if on pogo sticks. They pounded their chests while facing their hundred or so delirious fans seated across from their bench.
The rest of the crowd roared for the not-so-little men finally breaking through. Winthrop's only losses this season are to North Carolina, Wisconsin (in overtime), Maryland and Texas A&M. All got through the first round of the NCAA Tournament.
"I'm still in awe," Martin said about 30 minutes after the game. "I'm on Cloud 10."
On the bus ride to the arena, Martin told his teammates in an impassioned, impromptu speech: "We as Winthrop cannot lose again and be considered a good, mid-major team. We'd be a fluke team that can only win its weak conference."
No flukes. No more.
The win wasn't so much an upset as a long-awaited next step in the maturation of coach Gregg Marshall's nine-year basketball revival at the school of 6,600 students.
Last June, Marshall accepted the College of Charleston's offer to become its head coach - for almost twice his Winthrop salary of about $500,000. But 24 hours later, he said "No, thanks," and stayed on course with his below-the-radar Eagles.
"I told him, 'Follow your heart,' " Martin said of his coach. "He was torn up about it."
Now Marshall is one win from the NCAA regional semifinals with a team starting three seniors and two juniors. And Charleston is at home. It never even made it to the NCAAs following a 22-11 season.
"It's huge for me personally," Marshall said, while his players fielded congratulatory phone calls and text messages in the locker room. "It's huge for these players. It's huge for our league, huge for the state of South Carolina.
"It's nine years of putting your heart and soul into something and being close in the past."
The Irish, led by 14 points from Colin Falls, stormed back from 54-34 down to take a 63-62 lead with 2:21 left. But then it was all Winthrop.
"My season is over. My career is over. We're done," an angry, stone-faced Russell Carter said inside the Irish locker room, where words were as hard to come by as consolation smiles. Notre Dame (24-8) won its most games since 1974.
Carter, an All-Big East player and the Irish's leading scorer, shot just 6-for-15, including 0-for-6 from 3-point range.
Coach Mike Brey lamented a 37-10 run by Winthrop from the end of the first half into the second that erased Notre Dame's 24-17 lead.
In that span, Bradshaw -- at 6-foot-10 taller than any Notre Dame player -- moved wherever he pleased inside. Many of his 24 points came within 8 feet of the basket; Bradshaw is often a 3-point shooter.
"We were back on our heels," Brey said. "We looked young. They looked old."
But Winthrop made just three free throws over eight minutes, and the Irish closed to 57-56 on a putback by Carter off an airballed 3.
Notre Dame took the lead on Luke Harangody's turnaround. He was fouled on the play, but missed the free throw.
Then the Eagles soared again, scoring eight of the next 10 points. Bradshaw's shot inside and Chris Gaynor's 3-pointer put the Eagles up 67-63 with 1:30 to go.
After Irish freshman point guard Tory Jackson made one of two free throws, Michael Jenkins pushed the ball to Bradshaw for a sprinting dunk and one of his 11 assists. That gave the Eagles a 70-64 lead with 35 seconds left and essentially ended Notre Dame's season.
It also started a brand new era at Winthrop.
"It's a great day to be an Eagle," Marshall gushed. "It's a long time coming."
