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SU Breezes Through Buffalo
All the uncertainty over how SU would play without its starting center was promptly brushed aside Friday night and again Sunday afternoon as the Orange cruised through its first two challenges of the NCAA tournament. In knocking out the Catamounts and Bulldogs this weekend, ‘Cuse proved itself plenty worthy of the number one seed they received from the highly-scrutinized selection committee.
AO aside, Friday night’s victory was one of many balanced efforts that we’ve come to expect all season: the zone rendering Vermont’s attack fruitless (the Catamounts shot just 34.8% for the game), balanced scoring with five players hitting double figures, and a threatening long range game led by Andy Rautins and Wes Johnson. Aside from the last six minutes of the first half when Vermont went on a 14-2 run to cut the lead from 24 to 12, SU was in complete control the entire game, clobbering the Catamounts 79-56.
After a break Saturday, the Orange faced Gonzaga, a team who, according to prognosticators and experts, stood a chance of prevailing thanks to their front line of Robert Sacre and Elias Harris plus a successful coach who knows how to exploit the opposition’s weaknesses. As it turned out, Wes and Andy came out white-hot from beyond the arc, which went a long way in neutralizing the Zags. It wasn’t the same balanced attack we saw against Vermont, but it didn’t need to be, the way those two were shooting the rock.
Wes was aggressive in the early going, and Rautins scored the team’s first 11 points of the second half, all in the span of less than three minutes. Johnson also had his way inside defensively, corralling 14 rebounds in addition to a career-high 31 points. The scoring total is the highest for an SU player in the tournament since Gerry McNamara shot his way to 43 points against BYU in 2004.
The attack from Rautins and Johnson was so potent that when Rick Jackson picked up his third foul 11 minutes into the first half, the team didn’t skip a beat. DaShonte Riley’s number was called, and he played about as well as you could expect a raw freshman to play in a tournament atmosphere. He boxed out, didn’t look for his own shot, and deferred to his teammates, making an especially nice pass to Brandon Triche on a layup.
Speaking of Triche, he’s very quietly strung together a couple of nice games after some suspect play in the second half of conference play that led to a cut in playing time. Considering he’s a freshman (and not a very highly-touted one, at that), he’s playing very wisely. Two turnovers in 52 minutes of play so far in the tourney is a fantastic rate, and he stepped up with a couple of big threes in the first half of Sunday’s game while the score was still close. With one more threat for the opposition to respect, things will open up even more for SU.
You could say the same for Scoop Jardine. While he’s been on campus two years longer than Triche, he has the same amount of NCAA tournament experience since he redshirted last season. He had a great game against Vermont, including a disgusting crossover move on Nick Vier (0:35 mark) which resulted in a three-point play.
Up next is a Thursday night game in Salt Lake City against another set of Bulldogs in Butler. Nothing’s been said to make me believe that Onuaku will be ready to play, but the performance from this weekend makes me feel very confident in the team’s ability to overcome his absence with a short rotation.
