After topping Marquette Saturday, the ‘Cuse makes its annual trek to Manhattan for the conference tournament (pardon me…”Championship”). For the first time in four years, the Orange doesn’t need to make a big splash at the Garden to force the selection committee’s hand.

No one can keep the ‘Cuse out of the Big Dance this year, no miracle run is necessary, but there is still work to be done as the Orange jostles with its seeding fate. As it stands, SU is seeded as either a 5 or 6 seed, depending on whose projections you look at, with a few outlying negative nancies pegging the Orange with a 7 seed.

There was a lot of talk about the week in MSG expanding to include all 16 Big East teams. Fortunately, as far as SU is concerned, the expansion is moot since the Orange won’t play in the first round. After its first-round bye, the ‘Cuse will face off against the winner of the Tuesday nightcap between USF and Seton Hall, two teams who SU disposed of early on in the conference schedule.

The Hall came into the Dome on January 30 and Andy Rautins sent the Pirates scrambling to find a fire extinguisher. Rautins shot a stunning 7-10 from beyond the arc and was one of five Orange players who tallied double figures in a 100-76 victory.

The Pirates’ best victory of conference play was a 65-60 victory over the Hoyas. They picked up some steam with a five-game winning streak, but those victories came against GTown, Rutgers, St. John’s, Rutgers again and DePaul. The Pirates are one of those teams that would need a hot shooting night from Eugene Harvey, Jeremy Hazell and company coupled with a lid on the rim at the other end to advance. We’ve all seen those types of games, but we also know they aren’t probable. 

On January 2nd, SU had a hard time holding off the Bulls in Tampa, but escaped with a 59-54 victory. USF is in the bottom rung of teams whose presence in Manhattan this week is a direct result of the tournament’s expansion. Lacking any semblance of an offensive attack, USF likes to keep things slow and lull the opposition to sleep. Not surprisingly, that strategy hasn’t done the job in the deeply talented and brute Big East as the Bulls find themselves with a 4-14 conference record.

To add to this piecemeal scouting report, the Bulls and Pirates faced each other on Feburary 25, with the Pirates winning out 75-60 thanks to Jeremy Hazell’s 20-point performance. I see the Bulls trying to slow the pace but ultimately dropping this one. I’ll predict a Pirate victory, 70-59.

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 8th, 2009 at 10:47 pm by Brian G. . 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.