While the ‘Cuse rests for Sunday’s game against Villanova, we thought this was as good a time as any to discuss what we feel are the ten biggest hot-button issues facing this team. While LVO and I could go on ad nauseum on these topics and others, well, these ones appear less likely to put people to sleep.

10. Post-Gauntlet Reflections

Knowing what we know now, a stretch against a brutal set of opponents in Georgetown, Notre Dame, Pitt and Louisville doesn’t look as bad now as it did in mid-January. While Pitt and Louisville are still in the thick of things at the top of the conference, the Irish and Hoyas have fallen hard on their faces since they played the Orange. Georgetown is hanging in the NCAA tournament discussions by a thread, thanks largely to holding the nation’s toughest schedule, but Notre Dame is comatose even after dominating Louisville. As frustrating as it is that SU lost five of six, it could’ve been worse and such a stretch is the very reason why those victories against Memphis, Kansas and Florida are important to have in the back pocket.

9.  Wait! Wait.  I need you to check the tape.  I think I saw an elbow fly.

Okay, this is a mostly tongue in cheek concern, but there was something bizarre about KO’s ejection for a wayward elbow on Dajuan Summers.  I don’t know who is to blame here.  Was it JTIII for asking for a review on a play that garnered no foul or maybe it was the Emmy nominating, 3 seconds to fall after realizing, no head rubbing masterpiece that would have made Coach K’s floppers proud?  The point is, in a league known for seeing elbows fly with the regularity of an O’Hare jumbojet, this was a curious incident to make as the poster child for a point of emphasis call to the rest of league; especially considering Thabeet’s wild elbow on ED or Blair’s judo take down of the aforementioned Uconnvict were blown off like a Friday morning Psych class.  I really hope we don’t see coaches stopping play to see if player X got away with a stray one.  With several teams fighting for their tourney lives, we just may see teams do anything to get an advantage.  If that means cocking your ‘bo or accusing your enemy of the same, then it could be an intriguing stretch drive to say the least.

8.  Paul Harris – Lost?

The mercurial play of Paul Harris has confounded fans all season.  One minute he can “do it all”, the next minute he looks like someone trying to dribble a football.  With AO suffering from balky knees, PH was asked to carry the physical play and aggressive rebounding to another level.  Well the level he took it and the level he was supposed to take it were off by a mere 180 degrees.  PH has been AWOL both figuratively and literally, needing a trip by Hopkins to Niagara Falls to retrieve the despondent Harris.  The frustration of coaching PH was made quite evident in the Jack McCallum SI article where JB admonished Paul for deviating from the game plan against Thabeet.

Paul seems to do as good a job as one can against such incessant railing, but the bottom line is that Paul is going to do what Paul is going to do.  Negative in your grill sessions don’t seem to be raising his in-game IQ so what might work?  I think it was telling that against WV that the first play was called was for PH and that he admitted that it boosted his confidence.  While it may be more important to establish AO early, it wouldn’t hurt to actually run a play or two early for PH.  He was very effective with his midrange game last year and some of that production has tailed off this season.  Re-establishing Paul’s mid-range J via drive and dish by ED or JF may be the most effective way to get him some touches.  An idling Harris is not a recipe for a long NCAA run as the team seems to play at its best when PH is active on both ends of the floor.

7. Kristof Ongenaet’s Re-Emergence

When Arinze Onuaku went down with tendinitis, everyone’s favorite Belgian returned to action. In the games against Providence, West Virginia, Villanova and UConn, Kong averaged 20.5 minutes per game, compared to about 12 for the rest of the season (even less if you want to include the curtailed Georgetown game). Ongenaet is utilized best when he doesn’t have to be counted on for offense. I don’t think that’s anything new to most of us, but when you look at that putrid offensive performance against UConn, and see that KO played a season-high 28 minutes, how surprised can you be that SU couldn’t get anything going in the second half?

Obviously, it’s not all his fault that SU only posted 49 points; on the contrary, if it weren’t for him, SU would’ve been completely blown out of the gym, because he appeared to be the only guy on the court for SU who wanted to win. I think people look at the meltdown against Georgetown and are quick to say Boeheim should’ve switched to man defense when the Hoyas started hitting everything they released, and I see the sense in that, but if Ongenaet was available, I have very little doubt that he would’ve stopped the bleeding, even in a zone. That’s precisely the kind of situation that suits Kristof perfectly and it makes it even more of a shame that he was thrown out so unjustifiably.

6. Arinze Onuaku: The Straw That Stirs The Drink

As much as Rick Jackson has stepped up this year, when AO went down, the post game really took a lump. I think this was most apparent in the Providence game where the smaller Friars were outrebounded by just one. Sure, rebounding’s been a troubling category for the Orange all year, specifically giving up offensive boards, but when you’re getting challenged by the Villanovas and Providences of the conference, and when Paul Harris goes AWOL, and when Jackson goes from averaging 6-7 boards a game to 4 or 5 during that stretch without AO…well, you get the idea.

Maybe I’ve been conditioned to fear the worst with lower body injuries after what happened to Devo and Rautins. Especially with a big guy who needs healthy legs to support such a wide frame, there’s something about the words “nagging,” “knee,” and “problem” that when combined send me heading for the covers. I really thought AO’s days of putting up 12 and 9 in his sleep were over. I certainly wasn’t expecting that breakout return game against Georgetown from AO, but look what happened – 15 and 13, with the stamina to play 40 minutes. It looks like he’s back, but let’s see if he can be even more dominant against the doormats coming up than he was against Georgetown. If he’s healthy, those are one-sided battles down low.

5. Flynn/Devo — what we need out of our dynamic duo.

When AO was out of commission, JB basically told Flynn and Devo to do whatever they needed to do to score points.  Well they both scored, but it didnt’ translate to victories.    While they are the top two scorers on the team at 17.5 and 15.6 ppg, what we need out of these two is leadership.  Having Devo hit the key shots like against Georgetown.  In as much as they are leaders on the team in free throw percentage, they also lead the team in turnovers.  They must play smart.  It seems like Flynn blows one breakaway layup a game or tries to take the game over himself.  Devo travels too much when he penetrates without a plan.  That cannot happen if the team is going to beat quality opponents.  They have to keep everyone involved, play with more passion on the defensive end, and spend less time woofing at opponents.  They also can’t afford to hang their heads when things don’t go their way and they have to find ways to keep the team’s offensive flow going during the critical moments when the game is on the line and we are nursing a lead.

The experts always say that guard play is key for a deep NCAA run and we have two guys that are capable of taking us places in the tournament.  How far we advance is squarely in the hands of our dynamic duo.

4. JB, is it time to step aside?

Well you just knew this had to be a topic didn’t you?  It seems that the annual debate on when JB should retire gets hotter with each passing season.  The negatives are the same negatives that JB has lived with his entire career.  He doesn’t utilize his bench, he doesn’t develop his players, he stays in his beloved 2-3 zone too long, he won’t take a timeout until its too late and he puts his team in the tank too soon when he sits on a lead.  It doesn’t help that bubble teams have been labeled as “on the Boeheim” when describing their NCAA chances.  All this retirement talk might not be happening if the university hadn’t already named his successor.  So, this intrepid writer isn’t going to tell JB when he should or should not step down.

What I will point out is that JB tends to do his best coaching jobs on teams with lower expectations.  Look at the 2003 NCAA champion team.  Nothing was expected of that team.  Melo was a late developer turned all world and he was mixed into a core of Kueth Duany, Craig Forth, Hakim Warrick and GMac.  It was the ultimate role players paradise and they gelled with fellow role players like Josh Pace and Jeremy McNeil.  Same deal with the ’96 runner-ups.  Both squads had a known go to guy (And that role guy played the 4) and a bunch of players who knew their role.    This edition’s lack of an established 4 is giving JB fits.  Plus he has had his struggles getting the remaining guys to follow along with the game plan.  See item 8 above.

I will also point out that this season’s only real conference WTF game came on the road while AO gamely attempted to play through his knee injury.  However some of the losses have lacked the effort that most fans come to expect out of the team.  Giving up 100+ points to two BE teams has us all questioning this team’s desire on the defensive end.  Can JB be questioned for in-game management?  Well things would be a heck of a lot easier on my heart and quieter on the message boards if he would remedy one item.

And that lead’s us to…

3. Closing Out Games

At the beginning of the season, Syracuse developed a trend for being slow out of the gate and faced a lot of double-digit deficits that it never should have faced. More recently, a similar situation perks itself up on the back end of games, something we saw often last season. The difference is that last year, we could have chalked it up to having a shorthanded team and unfortunate as it was, it made sense. This year, there are no such excuses. Whether in the lead or coming from behind, SU is again struggling to deliver that knockout punch when it needs to most. I don’t know which is worse, the fact that SU coughed up the lead like it was a monstrous hairball, or the fact that it let DaJuan Summers get such a squeaky-clean look at the buzzer of regulation. I’ll give credit to Boeheim for taking AO out so as to eliminate the possibility of the Hoyas putting him on the line, but this was a game that will be remembered as a classic for all the wrong reasons.

I also want to revisit the Louisville game for the purpose of this discussion. This was a game that turned out to be uglier than just about everyone expected, but was still very winnable. The basket widened for Devo as he hit a three to put SU up 54-55 with 2:55 remaining, but it would be the last field goal the team would make that day. If guys like Flynn and Devo thrive when the spotlight’s shining like they say, they should be able to finish the jobs they’re given.

2. Projecting SU’s Seed in the Big East Tournament

Based on their remaining schedules and current records, UConn, Pitt and Louisville have comfortable holds on three of the top four spots in the Big East, which this year also means they can watch from the Madison Square Garden stands for a couple days before taking to the court. Marquette, the other team in the top four, has a much longer road to go with road games at Georgetown, Louisville and Pitt remaining and home games against the Orange and Huskies. That’s a recipe for disaster and it will be interesting to see how the Golden Eagles fare. Is that extra prep time enough motivation to finish strong?

Should Marquette blow lose grasp of that fourth spot, Villanova is next in line, two games back. The SU game is the only one left in ‘Nova’s schedule where I see the Wildcats as underdogs. They also have DePaul, Georgetown, Notre Dame and Providence on the slate, so this a much different situation than Marquette. All told, anything can happen, but I’m not holding my breath on SU getting that coveted 4^th spot, which would mean two extra days of rest.

So now we get to the next bundle of four teams and just one bye, and this is where it gets really murky. Right now, there are four teams sitting with six losses – SU, Providence, Cincinnati and West Virginia. Whoever finishes worst between ‘Nova and Marquette should get the 5^th seed, so that leaves us with those four teams I mention above fighting for three spots.

Providence, who has overperformed all year (and finally broke tonight against Louisville), has the toughest remaining schedule of those four (Notre Dame, Pitt, at Rutgers, at Villanova). Next is probably Syracuse, followed by Cincinnati and West Virginia. If the chips fall where I think they will, I see SU with a six seed at best and an eight seed at worst.

1.  How far can this team go in the NCAAs?

Current seedings have the Cuse as a six seed.  That seems about right, given the strong schedule the Orange has played this year.  So how far do we expect this team to go?  I think you have to look beyond the seeding number to really assess a team’s chances.  So throw out the six seed equals losing in Round Two.  We all know that so much depends on matchups.

So what type of team is going to be the best team to play?  The most favorable matchup for Syracuse would be to be drawn up against teams with less athletic teams at the guard position.  Our biggest strength is that we have a pair of guards who can do damage by breaking down their opposition and getting to the basket.  Teams without a strong center are also good matchups for us as it allows for both AO and Rick Jackson to have success with their lost post moves.  It would also help to get matched with a weak 3 point shooting team.  Take Memphis for example, they couldn’t hit from deep and we sat in that zone all day and there wasn’t much they could do.

And what type of team don’t we want to see?  Well, we have struggled with team’s that have very deliberate offensive styles.  It has been proven that we lack the tenacity to play defense for the full 35 seconds.  Teams that can slow things down tend to frustrate our players.  A team with equal talent (and that will be just about everyone once you get out of the first round), that likes to get up and down the floor.  For the same reason as a deliberate team, greyhound teams tend to exploit our lack of defense and also seem to place too much burden in the hands of our guards (at least in their minds) to counter quickly.  Good three point shooting teams will also be a concern since we have seen way more zone as the season has progressed.  Teams that have torched the zone have gone on and won.

So if I had to evaluate our team’s NCAA tourney potential based on the current Lunardi draw, I would like are chances for a deep run with team’s like Duke (not physical in the low box, but definitely capable of stroking the 3) and Memphis (not a strong shooting club) as potential matchups, but not too deep as we have yet to find an answer to UConn and Thabeet.  The matchups will dictate our destiny.

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 19th, 2009 at 1:02 pm by LvilleOrange . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.