SOUTH BEND — December must-win games are rare.

But on a five-game skid after a 4-0 start and down the best player on the roster, Notre Dame men’s basketball was put in a spot Saturday where a win, no matter how ugly, was of the highest importance.

The Fighting Irish got it, thanks to a season-high 25 points from sophomore guard Braeden Shrewsberry. It matched his career high.

“We’re kind of going through the same thing right now, trying of figure out our teams without or best guys,” Irish coach Micah Shrewsberry said of his group, which topped Syracuse 69-64 at Purcell Pavilion. “This was kind of a battle of wills, and different guys stepped up on each side.

“Credit to them but proud of our guys for really digging one out down the stretch. We needed to be in a close game and needed to win a close game so our guys can start to build some belief.”

It was the fifth game without reigning Atlantic Coast Conference Rookie of the Year Markus Burton. Burton was injured early in the Irish’s first of three games at the Player Era Festival in Las Vegas two weeks ago. The guard, who was averaging 21 points, suffered an MCL injury that won’t require surgery but will keep Notre Dame’s best player out indefinitely.

Syracuse (4-4, 0-1 ACC) was in a similar spot without Notre Dame transfer J.J. Starling. Starling broke his hand earlier in the week. He was averaging a team-high 19.8 points.

Without both showstoppers, the result was often disjointed for both teams in the conference opener. Notre Dame, though, learned it still has some talent down the lineup, and each name took turns making their case why they could be the one to lead the Irish forward without Burton.

“We lost a lot of close ones in Vegas,” Irish guard J.R. Konieczny said. “We know we have the talent. We know we have the defense to compete with all these teams, so it’s just not getting too over our heads and not getting too far under with our emotions.”

Konieczny was second on the team in scoring with 15 points off the bench. Guard Tae Davis matched that total with 15 points as well. Davis, a starter who has been the primary calling card in the post-Burton era, got a helping hand from Konieczny, who looked more like his junior-year self for the first time in a while.

“I have to give a hug shoutout to Coach (Kyle) Getter because he was telling me the whole week like ‘J.R., we need you to get back to the old J.R.,’” Konieczny said. “’We miss the joy you used to have out there.’ I’ll admit, my body language kind of sucked this past week, and it was getting to my head. Just coming out here with confidence and I give credit to coaches for getting me ready.”

Notre Dame led for the entirety of the first half and led 14-9 at the midway point. Davis entered into foul trouble when he picked up his second at the 9:44 mark. He had a team-high seven points up to that point.

The Orange quickly tied the game at 16 before Konieczny sent the Irish on a mini 5-0 spurt to take a 21-16 lead. Notre Dame grew its advantage to eight points before taking a 30-26 score into halftime.

Free throws were never easy for either team. At the break, the Orange were just 8-of-14. The Irish weren’t much better, shooting 2-of-6. Konieczny led all scorers with 13. Shrewsberry had seven points at the break.

In the second half, the Orange worked themselves in front several times. The visitors excelled after a Notre Dame bucket, oftentimes inbounding the ball and scoring on the other end within 15 seconds.

Then Shrewsberry heated up. Cashing in six 3-pointers on 11 attempts, the sophomore guard put the Irish into a winning position when he broke a 60-60 stalemate with under three minutes to go. That triple put the Irish in front for good, sinking the Orange.

A 3-pointer by Elijah Moore at the buzzer was no good for the visitors. Syracuse was 0-of-9 from distance, making it the first game in 10 seasons the Orange failed to record a 3-point basket.

After four-straight contests on the road, Notre Dame’s coach relished in being home but more so what the team was finally able to do during the week.

“I think the biggest thing that helped us this week was being able to take Wednesday completely off, being able to come in Thursday and practice for an hour when guys were getting their legs back,” Coach Shrewsberry said. “We had to clean up a lot of details, especially offensively.”

Scoring for Notre Dame were Shrewsberry, Konieczny, Davis, Kebba Njie (9), Matt Allocco (4) and Julian Roper II (1). Njie also grabbed nine rebounds against Syracuse big man Eddie Lampkin.

“I think Kebba, he’s probably been the guy that’s been affected the most without Markus of getting easy shots around the paint,” Coach Shrewsberry said. “I challenged him the other day about his physicality in front of the whole team in the film room, about for us to take another step, he needed to be more physical with how he was playing. I think he did that.”

Syracuse dropped its second straight game and its fourth in the past five. The Orange were led by dual 20-point showings from Donnie Freeman and Jyare Davis. Trailing in the scoring column were Jacquan Carlos (8), Lampkin (5), Chris Bell (4), Moore (4), Lucas Taylor (2) and Kyle Cuffe (1).

Syracuse shot 16-of-24 at the line. Notre Dame finished 17-of-27.

“Every one is a dog fight,” Coach Shrewsberry said about the relief of starting unbeaten in conference. “They’re just so tough. It’s important for one, for our psyche, right? We needed to get back on the right side of winning, and we needed to prove to ourselves we can win a close game. Now you have a conference win that you can put in your back pocket and keep moving forward.”

The Fighting Irish (5-5, 1-0 ACC) will jump back into nonconference play Wednesday when Dartmouth comes to South Bend at 7 p.m.