The stark reality of last place really hit home for me this week.  Having endured first hand what had to be one of the most lifeless and frustrating contests since, well maybe two years ago when I saw SU play Miami Oh, the Orange has once again settled to the bottom of the conference standings.  Since the end of the game I have been at a loss for words.  It has been a difficult decade for diehard Orangemen fans.

When the season started, I felt pretty optimistic.  Doug Marrone and Co had breathed new life into the team and program.  The team played inspired againist Minnesota, hung tough with Penn St, and through the ball all over the field against Northwestern.  Hey, this could be a nice year, I remember thinking.  Then came Maine, yes we won, but they showed just how far we had to go.  They were more imaginative, took chances and threw caution to the wind.  It worked for half before we finally got a beat on them.

Then the old Syracuse returned.  Mike Williams got full of himself, we were able to endure Akron, but USF, WV and Cincy exposed the cold hard truth.  We were a predictable and limit offense and had a decent defense will clear holes that could be exposed whenever a good team wanted to.  Suspension, injuries and cautious playcalling as led to a downard spiral to the season that reached rock bottom again with this loss to Louisville.

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Time for whats left of this Orange team to hit the road and try to keep bowl eligibility alive against the Cardinals. Read along with LvilleOrange and Reyes39 and see if its possible that the Orange can beat the Cards for the third straight year. 

When: November 14thth, 2009 – 12:00 PM

Where: Louisville, KY at Papa Johns Cardinal Stadium

Capacity: 42,000

Television: Time Warner

Pittsburgh Reading Material (via pacusefan): Louisville Reading Material

The Spread: The line opened at Louisville -7.0 and has risen to Louisville -7.5

Rivalry info: This will be the ninth meeting between these schools.  Syracuse owns a 5-3 advantage in the series and has won the last two meetings against the Cardinals.  Syracuse is 677-478-49 all time. Pittsburgh is 441-426-41 all time.

Coaches: Louisville -Steve Kragthorpe – 3rd season at Louisville (14-19 overall.) Syracuse- Doug Marrone – 1st season at Syracuse (3-6 overall.)

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Another week, another bad spell ATS.  Cuse could not hold and Louisville played it’s most competitive game of the year.  League games are on the next 3 nights so let’s get at it.  Again, all lines used are provided here:

Last Week: 3-0    Year to date: 47-6

ATS: 1-2                Year to date: 23-17

Thursday:

South Florida at Rutgers: Line Rutgers -2;O/U 44.5.  Time for Rutgers to show what they are made of.  Their defense sure has been playing better of late.  Can they blitz enough to contain BJ Daniels?  I was impressed with USF against WV, if they play that way again they should win this game.  Line started as a pick’em, if USF can make some FGs they should win.  USF 24-20.

Friday:

West Virginia at Cincinnati: Line UC -8.5;O/U 54.  WV’s offense has ground to a halt in the last couple of weeks.  UC’s defense was exposed by UConn.  Whomever can control this side will put pressure on UC to rack up the points on a decent WV defense.  Does Pike get any burn this week and how will he respond?  The game being at Cincy should help.  I expect a close game as WV will be ready for this one, but Cincy should defend the home field.  UC 38-33.

Saturday:

Syracuse at Louisville: Line UofL -7.5;O/U 46.  The Battle for 7th in the BE or as Ben Folds Five says from a fan standpoint it’s a Battle of Who Could Care Less.  Both sides depleted with injuries.  Third string walkon Will Stein could be making his 3rd straight start and Victor Anderson could be out again for the Cards.  The Cuse is missing two big cogs in Art Jones and Max Suter on D.  Neither team is too adept in the redzone.  Pick saved for the preview.

Notre Dame at Pittsburgh: Line Pitt -6.5;O/U 59.  Looks like a nice BE matchup if only ND would oblige and enter the conference for football.  Irish should show more fight after losing to Navy last week.  Pitt continues to roll with Dion Lewis and Bill Stull leading the offense.  Pitt will face a tough ND passing attack.  Containing Golden Tate will be a top priority.  Any good BE fan surely isn’t picking or rooting for ND this week – Pitt 38-28.

So much for that bum ankle. Wednesday night, Andy Rautins led SU in another blowout, scoring 22 points in 20 minutes with a red-hot 7-10 performance beyond the arc, brushing aside all who doubted his health status going into the game against Robert Morris. It’s always a good thing when you have a starter totaling more points than minutes played*.

*This has happened just four other times this decade, after some cursory research:

1. Gerry McNamara, in his memorable game against BYU in the 2004 NCAA Tournament (43 points in 37 minutes)
2. Paul Harris, against Colgate last season (22 points in 21 minutes)
3. Preston Shumpert against Binghamton in 2001 (36 points in 28 minutes)
4. Shumpert again, against Albany in 2000 (30 points in 28 minutes)

Big ups to statsheet.com, where you can find a very thorough archive of college basketball stats going back to the late 90′s. They don’t archive stats going back this far, but I have to think Lawrence Moten turned the trick at least as many times as Shumpert. Read the rest of this entry »

Less than 48 hours after topping Albany, SU will go to battle with the Colonials of Robert Morris. Hailing from the Northeastern Conference, RMU clinched an NCAA tournament bid last season by winning their conference tournament and promptly lost to Michigan State by 15 in the opening round.

Both the Orange and Colonials are recovering from losing their best players from 2008-09 but each also has a crew of tested players on which to shoulder the brunt of those losses. For Robert Morris, they look to rebound from the graduations of 2008-09 NEC Player of the Year Jeremy Chappell and NEC Defensive Player of the Year Bateko Francisco. Then again, RMU lost the 2007-08 NEC POY and ended up being just fine thanks to the contributions of Rob Robinson, the team’s leading scorer (11.2 PPG) and rebounder (5.6 RPG), so maybe there’s just something in the water in Pittsburgh. Read the rest of this entry »

The Orange broke the seal on the 2009-10 season with an easy win against Albany Monday night, helping Jim Boeheim to his milestone 800th victory. The Great Danes were tremendously outmatched from the opening tip and Syracuse did what they were supposed to do in putting the game away early, primarily in the paint.

The defense was very active all game, by far the most positive aspect of the entire night. The Orange forced an astounding 32 turnovers, recording 21 steals and playing a big role in Albany’s terrible night from the field (27.3%).

Despite not cracking the scoring column for the first 12 minutes of the game, Wes Johnson did a nice job of filling the stat sheet in his ‘Cuse debut with 12 points, eight rebounds, four assists and six steals before all was said and done.  It’s going to be very exciting having him around to cause all sorts of problems for opposing defenses. His scoring will come largely from transition baskets, cleaning up the offensive glass and the occasional jumper, and not so much on dribble drives, and I’m quite ok with that. Read the rest of this entry »

Opening night is finally upon us – with only three D1 games on the Monday night slate, there will be a lot of eyes on the Orange as they look to get past the LeMoyne loss. SU is matched up against the Albany Great Danes, who had an unimpressive 15-16 record last season in the marginal America East conference.

A win in the first game of the Coaches vs. Cancer Classic would make Jim Boeheim just the 8th coach in NCAA history to record 800 Division 1 victories, and of that group, only Mike Krzyzewski and Jim Calhoun are still active.

Syracuse doesn’t have as much history against Albany as it does against other regional opponents, but the outcome of this game isn’t hard to predict. The two teams have met just five times since 1980, but Syracuse’s 17-point victory in 2004 signifies the smallest margin of victory in those five meetings. The Great Danes are a very young team, with eight freshmen on its roster. They return their two leading scorers from last season in 6’6″ forward Will Harris and 6’0″ point guard Tim Ambrose, who combined for 27.3 points per game.

For Syracuse, the interesting points will be seeing how time is split up between Brandon Triche and Scoop Jardine, as well as how the SU bench asserts itself behind the firmly entrenched starters. Kris Joseph will be the first “big” off the bench, but I’m personally curious to see a pair of shooters in Mookie Jones and James Southerland compete against one another.

If Albany is to stand any chance in this one, they have to do what LeMoyne did – use their small size to their advantage with lots of cuts and hot shooting – but against a Syracuse zone defense rather than the man-to-man, it’s far easier said than done.

Friday, I previewed my expectations for the Orange’s starting five, and now we look to the bench. Primarily, we will see a pair of sophomores (one redshirt) and a trio of freshmen (one redshirt) spelling the starters, with apologies to Brandon Reese, Matt Tomaszewski, and Nick Resavy.

1. Scoop Jardine
2. Kris Joseph
3. Mookie Jones
4. James Southerland
5. DaShonte Riley
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DC3 lone bright spot for Cuse

The Orange fought valiantly again this afternoon, but the results were the same as the Orangemen went down to the Pitt Panthers 37-10 on beautiful day in Pittsburgh.

The Cuse looked great early, as Delone Carter ran with abandon.  However the familiar theme of not finishing off drives led to the Orange managing just a field goal.  That lack of production really hurt SU.  Once again, another terrible third down performance and a killer interception for a TD at the end of the half spelled doom and ended any chance of an upset.

The pick seemed to deflate Syracuse and relax Pitt.  Dion Lewis was able to get his running game going and really it was one of the worst days for the defense as they seemed to give up chunks of yardage most of the afternoon.

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I was doing pretty good on my picks overall, but this last week was brutal.  USF proved they are still formidable at home and UConn is having troubles getting on track in the wake of Jasper Howard’s death.  It’s a real light schedule this week in the BE, only 3 games.  Again, all lines used are provided here:

Last Week: 2-2    Year to date: 44-6

ATS: 2-2                Year to date: 22-15

Syracuse at Pittsburgh: Line Pitt -21;O/U 51.  Syracuse has had quite an eventful week with the suspensions, quitting of MW, the “tears” of Marrone and the comments on the fans booing.  Thankfully the team takes to the road where they can circle the wagons.  Pitt is fresh off a bye and shouldn’t really be looking past us, although if you look past us you see ND, WV and Cincy on the schedule.  The number just keeps going up.  If Lewis runs well, the Orange will be in a squeeze this week.  I like the points as we should be able to hang around.  Pitt 28-14.

Louisville at West Virginia: Line WV -17;O/U 54.  Man, it wasn’t long ago that this was a huge game.  I went to Cards first “Blackout” versus WV and it was a wild scene.  Now look at this game.  The Cards went with walk-on Will Stein to win over Arkansas St.  WV again struggled at USF.  The Cards should have Adam Froman back but what impact will they have.  The D is totally beat up and Noel Devine should have plenty of space to run.  WV shoould win easily – 41-17.

Connecticut at Cincinnati: Line UC -17;O/U 51.5.  This game should have the Bearcats attention after the Huskies whacked them last year.  UConn has special teams issues so containing Mardy Gilyard on kicks will take on an added focus.  UC must continue to impress to sway partial BCS voters.  Zach Frazier is back in the saddle for UConn and he is again struggling.  Still I think UConn matches up well defensively and should be able to run the ball.  I don’t think they can win but the game should stay close.  UC 27-21.