Going into Friday night’s game against Oklahoma, there wasn’t a single person among SU’s devoted fanbase who hadn’t heard of Blake Griffin and what he was capable of doing to the Orange. Sure enough, Griffin turned in another spectacular tournament performance, but the deadeye outside shooting of his teammates (specifically, the besleeved Tony Crocker) were the ones that put OU in cruise control. The Sooners went 9-21 from three point range, the only spot on the court from which Griffin didn’t dominate.

On the other end of the court, SU couldn’t buy a three in the first half. I can’t blame Devendorf and Rautings for not leaving the guns in their holsters in the first half, because many of their looks were good, if not wide open. Nevertheless, they clanked, they clunked, the rattled in and out – think of a way for a team to miss a three pointer and it happened to the Orange, while the Sooners swished seemingly everything it threw up.

The key play of the game, without question, was Griffin’s steamrolling of Jonny Flynn near the end of the first half. You have to admire the multitude of things Flynn is willing to do to help Syracuse win, but the decision to get in Griffin’s way was questionable at best, and I’d stick by that even if the play didn’t result in Flynn bruising his back.

I understand that getting the charge call could’ve been a major turning put for SU heading into the locker room, but there’s a line between trying to spark your team and making an inadvisable play. Flynn paid the unfortunate price as he winced through the second half, making me cringe as badly as when I see Larry David make a social faux-pas.

The Orange had the talent and momentum to make it further than they did, so the abrupt end, despite it coming in the second weekend of the NCAA tournament, is very disappointing to me. I think the fact that SU hadn’t made it to the tournament in the program’s last two seasons lowered many fans’ expectations to either getting the team’s name called on Selection Sunday or winning a game or two. That’s totally fine, everyone has their opinions and their own benchmarks of what will make them happy, but I just thought this team was primed for a deeper run than making the Sweet 16, even if it meant beating a team with the National Player of the Year. If you weren’t too shaken by the defeat to watch North Carolina topple the Sooners Sunday afternoon, you’d know what I mean.

For those who didn’t watch, Oklahoma’s perimeter game was completely nonexistent Sunday afternoon against North Carolina, as they went 2-19 from three, and didn’t make a three pointer until the waning minutes of the second half. After torching the ‘Cuse, Tony Crocker went 0-5 from three, 2-8 from the field and scored four points in 25 minutes. You either take solace in the fact that Oklahoma is on its way home or you get that much more frustrated that Crocker’s first good game in seven weeks came against Syracuse in a single-elimination tournament.

Further suggested therapy: at least one viewing per week of the 2009 Big East Tournament quarterfinal vs. UConn.

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 29th, 2009 at 10:55 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.