Labels: Chill Out Already, Summertime Is Easy

A banner year for the Orange

For a blog devoted to Syracuse Athletics, 2012-2013 was one of those years where you look back at it with a big smile on your face. Here at Orange::44, we focus mainly on football, men's basketball, and men's lacrosse -- the "Big 3" -- the money-makers for the Department. Over the life of this blog, each of those sports teams has had some dark days: the Greg Robinson Era, the NIT years, and lacrosse not making the tournament. So for a year like this to come along, where each of those sports saw great success, well, it makes being a fan a pleasure.

Football
The 2012 football season seems so long ago now, doesn't it? We're nearly nine months removed from the start of the season, and five months removed from the bowl game; and the 2013 season begins in three months. When it all started, did anyone realistically think the team would win the Big East? Have a winning season? Make it to a bowl game? Be Doug Marrone's final season? It was a surprisingly successful football season. The team had marquee wins over Pittsburgh, UConn, Louisville, Missouri, and South Florida. Ryan Nassib became one of the most successful quarterbacks in Syracuse history. After finishing with a respectable 7-5 regular season record and a share of the Big East title, Syracuse was invited to the Pinstripe Bowl to face West Virginia, a school who had just completed its first season in the Big 12 after competing for several years alongside Syracuse in the Big East. The annual battle for the Schwartzwalder Trophy had ended, but the Orange once again found itself lined up against the Mountaineers. Syracuse dominated at Yankee Stadium and brought the George Steinbrenner trophy back to Central New York once again.

Offensive lineman Justin Pugh gave up his final year of eligibility, entered the NFL draft, and was selected in the first round by the New York Giants. Joining him in the Meadowlands is Ryan Nassib, who was drafted much later than expected by the pre-draft hype. Shamarko Thomas also heard his name called on draft weekend.

Losing all that talent, what was Doug Marrone to do for next year? Sadly for the Orange, the answer was "Become the Head Coach of the Buffalo Bills." That news broke just a week after the Pinstripe Bowl victory. Reaction among Orange faithful was mixed; while most were happy for him being able to reach the pinnacle of one's coaching career and realize a life-long dream, fans were left feeling betrayed as Marrone took most of his Orange coaching staff down the thruway to Buffalo. Thankfully, he left Scott Shaffer behind, who Athletics Director Dr. Daryl Gross named the new Head Coach. So far he's said and done all the right things, and has done his best to put together a good recruiting class and maintain continuity within the program for the existing players, as the team heads into its first season in the ACC. I think it's fair to say we're all cautiously optimistic for this coming season and for years to come.

Men's Basketball
Oh Jim Boeheim, you old curmudgeon, you. But you're our curmudgeon, and we love you. As you may recall, the season started with a stabbing at Midnight Madness. The first game was on the deck of an aircraft carrier in San Diego. Jim Boeheim reached win #900, and shortly thereafter passed Bob Knight for second on the all-time wins list. There were a couple bumps in the road as the season trudged on, but this team was looking really good going into the first part of February. Hell, they had even traveled to Louisville, the number one team at the time, and beat them! But shortly into February, things started going badly. And then the ball wouldn't go in the hoop. We all remember that horrible February stretch. Georgetown visited the Carrier Dome in late February for one last Dome tilt as Big East foes, and beat the Orange in front of the largest Carrier Dome crowd in history. A week later, Louisville came in and avenged the earlier loss. The following week, Syracuse closed out the regular season by traveling to Georgetown, played one of the worst games in recent history, and got beat by the Hoyas. At that point, most people were writing off this Orange squad for a quick Big East Tournament exit and likely an embarrassing first round NCAA exit to an inferior team.

But our favorite curmudgeon still liked his team. He got them ready to compete in New York for the Orange's final Big East Tournament. A win over Seton Hall, and then over Pittsburgh, set up one last chance to play Georgetown as Big East members. The only way fate could have done that better is to set that up as the Big East title game. But we settled for the semifinals. And as fate would have it, these longtime rivals couldn't settle the score in a regulation 40-minute game. It took an overtime period, but finally Syracuse was victorious over the Hoyas. Already exceeding most people's expectations, the championship for Syracuse would go through Louisville. Sadly, a monster first-half Orange lead quickly flipped to a Cardinals blowout, and Syracuse went home runner-up.

Confidence was returned to the vocabulary of Orange fans heading into the NCAA Tournament. Games against Montana and California in the Oakland pod earned Syracuse a spot in the Sweet 16, playing in the much easier to travel to Washington DC. But there, #1-seed Indiana loomed. Arguably the most prolific offense of the tournament, the Hoosiers were held by the Orange 2-3 zone defense, as Syracuse advanced to the Regional Final against familiar foe Marquette. The same Syracuse shut-down defense did its thing against the Golden Eagles, and somehow, after that crazy ride, Syracuse found itself with its ticket punched to the Final Four in Atlanta. Unfortunately the Michigan Wolverines were too much for the Orange, but you can't not all that a successful season!

Men's Lacrosse
It used to be that Syracuse was one of a few elite national lacrosse programs: the best recruits, season by season success, guaranteed Final Four berths, and 11 National Championships. But the sport of lacrosse is one of the fastest growing sports in the country, and many more programs are competing at the elite level. Thus, the best recruits are more spread out, random teams may dominate from year to year, and Syracuse hadn't been to a Final Four since 2009. Coming off last year's disappointing season and first-round exit, there were a lot of questions surrounding the 2013 men's lacrosse team. Panic set in when the season opener was lost to Albany after two overtimes. Luckily, the Orange quickly righted the ship, with impressive wins over traditionally elite programs such as Virginia, Johns Hopkins, Princeton, and Cornell. Of course, of that group, only Cornell earned a Tournament bid. The season had a couple low points, namely the loss at Villanova, and the loss at home against Hobart. The team finished out the season strong, however, with a hard-fought win over Notre Dame in the Big City Classic, and then a mere five days later, another win over Notre Dame in the semifinals of the Big East Tournament. By defeating Villanova in the Big East Championship, the Orange earned an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament, and along with that, impressed the selection committee enough to earn a #1-seed.

In the Tournament, the Orange kept drama high. Whether it was overcoming early deficits, or giving up a big lead only to find a way to win in the waning minute(s) of the game, Syracuse made its way to the Final Four in Philadelphia. A tight win over Denver in the Final Four brought Syracuse to the title game against Duke. While it looked like Syracuse would dominate early, Duke woke up at the same time Syracuse fell asleep, and cruised to an easy 16-10 victory. It wouldn't be a 12th title for Syracuse, but the seniors finally got to taste a Final Four (and probably some cheese steaks).

Final Thoughts
For these "Big 3" combined, we saw two Big East titles, one bowl victory, and two Final Fours. Aside from the "Big 3," the women's basketball team had arguably its best season in school history and made an NCAA appearance. The women's lacrosse team carried over last season's success, and repeated a trip to the Final Four as well. Other team and individual sports at Syracuse also enjoyed some of their best seasons in recent memory. Suffice to say, the Syracuse University Athletics Department is sitting pretty right now. That's a great position to be in heading into the ACC in one month. The sports have done their part to invigorate the fan base; now it's up to us, the fans, to step up and support these student athletes as best as we can!

And with that, it's hiatus time. Don't expect much in the way of updates on this site until August comes around and we start preparing for football. That Penn State game is, what, 92 days away? We'll of course be here if anything big happens in the meantime, including legal analysis if necessary. Overall this season we haven't had to do much in the way of lawdog posts, but if the situation arises, you know who to turn to. We sure hope to not have to do that! So hopefully, until August, have a great summer!

Labels: Summertime Is Easy, Year In Review

Duke is STILL winning faceoffs

If you kept tabs on Syracuse's run through the NCAA Tournament to Monday's Championship game against Duke, you know that in many ways it was an unlikely run. In fact, coming off last year's 9-8 season and opening round loss to Duke, along with starting this season with an overtime loss to Albany, it's unlikely to even think that the Orange would have earned a #1 seed, let alone advance to the title game. In every tournament game - against Bryant, against Yale, and against Denver - Syracuse dug itself into a hole that required a comeback to achieve victory. You very easily could look at any of those games and said "Syracuse deserves to lose." But the team fought; they persevered; they won. So when the title game looked all too familiar, those who knew the recent history didn't panic. Maybe the team didn't panic either. Maybe they were complacent in the "Don't worry, we've got this" attitude. Whatever it was, it was not enough to secure a victory, as the Duke Blue Devils beat the Syracuse Orange 16-10 to earn the NCAA Division I Men's Lacrosse Championship.

The title game could not have started any better for Syracuse. In a first quarter completely dominated by the Orange, Duke was left surrendering goals to Billy Ward, Kevin Rice, Dylan Donahue, and Luke Cometti. Everything was clicking on offense for the #1 seed, and nothing was going right for the Duke offense. When the Blue Devils weren't committing sloppy turnovers, they were taking shots that Syracuse goalkeeper Dominic Lamolinara was seeking with eagle-eyed vision.

Those four unanswered goals in the first quarter became a 5-0 lead early in the second, as Donahue got back on the board again. 90 seconds later, Duke finally found net, but just over a minute later, Scott Loy scored to again return the Orange lead to five. And then, Duke woke up. The Blue Devils scored the next four goals to close out the half, and enter the locker room down only 6-5.

An early third quarter Duke goal left the game tied at 6, and through the next eight and a half minutes of game play, neither team scored. Donahue scored again, giving the Orange a 7-6 lead at 4:28 in the third. But then Duke never looked back. Four Duke goals closed out the third quarter, and a 10-7 margin was brought to the game's final 15 minutes.

Duke didn't let up as the fourth began. Goals at 13:39, 12:29, and 10:47 gave the Blue Devils a 13-7 lead. JoJo Marasco finally got on the scoreboard with unassisted goals at 8:11 and 7:36 to narrow the gap to 13-9. Duke, however, kept winning faceoffs and hitting dagger shots to keep this game safely out of reach for the Orange.

As you no doubt have read elsewhere, or witnessed by watching the game, it was Duke's dominance at the faceoff X (or dot, or whatever it's being called these days) that was essential to the trophy returning to Durham. Duke faceoff specialist Brendan Fowler not only won 20 of 28 faceoffs on the day (Duke was 21-30 on the day), but he also won the draws when they counted most. Those gaps in the game when Syracuse wasn't scoring? It wasn't because they couldn't get things going on offense. It was because they were on defense. Because Duke won the faceoffs. Syracuse has dealt with some great faceoff specialists this season, notably in the postseason, and still won. Their offensive efficiency was just that good. But it just wasn't to be this Memorial Day.

And so, we look back at what ended up to be a very successful season of lacrosse. For much of the season it was a wide-open field, and heading into Selection Sunday, Syracuse secured some great resume-building wins to earn that #1 seed. And making it to the title game proved that Syracuse was seeded right where it needed to be seeded. And, but for giving up a 5-0 lead and being owned by a faceoff wizard, Syracuse may have won title #12. But we'll never know.

At any rate, congratulations to the entire team and coaching staff for an amazing season. I'm especially happy for this year's seniors, who waited their entire college careers to play in a Final Four - an otherwise guarantee for all classes dating back thirty years. And they got to play in a title game, and almost win it. The underclassmen gained some valuable experience, not only in these tournament games, but in all the one-goal games throughout the season. They'll be well-seasoned vets for next season. Next season. First in the ACC. Yikes! We'll take suggestions on the correct adjective to use when describing the ACC Lacrosse league.

Check back later this week, as I wrap up the 2012-2013 year of Syracuse University Athletics before embarking on our annual summer hiatus.

Labels: Championship, Lacrosse, NCAA Tournament, Recap

This is what "nearly 10,000" looks like, right ESPNU?

As the #1 seed of the Tournament, the Syracuse Orange should, in theory, have had the easiest game in round one. Their opponent, unseeded Bryant University from Rhode Island, had a losing record and was only in the Tourney due to winning their conference tourney. And then Syracuse went down 4-0.

The scouting report on the Bryant Bulldogs was basically this: they lost a crap ton of games to start the season, then won a bunch in a row, including their conference championship; their face-off specialist, Kevin Massa, led the nation in face-off percentage and would frustrate the Orange at the X. And... yeah. That. The final tally in this game was 22-1. I don't think I've ever seen a face-off deficit like that.

But that 4-0 start by the Bulldogs was about as good as they would get on Sunday night. Syracuse battled back to make it 4-3 at the end of the first. The second quarter was much slower for each team on offense, Syracuse scoring twice, and Bryant just once. So if you do the math right, that's a 5-5 tie at halftime.

Coming out of the locker room for the second half, Syracuse decided to play like a #1 seed, and rattled off goals at 12:54 and 9:24 to go up by two. Bryant battled back for a score at the 7:00 mark, but Syracuse answered with two more before Bryant found the back of the net once more with just under one minute left in the third quarter.

With a 9-7 lead going into the final 15 minutes of play, Syracuse was in the driver's seat. They had battled back after a horrible spot, tied the game, and in the second half attained the lead and kept it. Though the two goal margin at this point was nothing like a landslide, with the momentum swung entirely toward Syracuse, the Orange was in a great position to wrap down the final 15 minutes. Three more goals in the final quarter assured the victory for Syracuse, and the first round win over Bryant 12-7.

For Syracuse, the top scorer was Dylan Donahue, who had three goals on four shots. Kevin Rice and Luke Cometti each had two goals. JoJo Marasco, Scott Loy, Billy Ward, Matt Walters, and Ryan Barber each scored for the Orange as well. Rice also helped with two assists, while Marasco and Ward each had one assist. It was clear that Bryant was focusing on the Marasco game, so while they tried neutralizing JoJo, the rest of the team stepped up. I gotta give a lot of credit to the coaching staff and the players of Syracuse to make the adjustments they needed to make to find a way to win.

I already mentioned it, but damn, that Massa kid is downright nasty at the X. I assume if he's cheating or otherwise doing something he's not allowed to do, that he would have been called out on it by now; so, I guess he's just really, really good. Kudos to him.

Luckily, for Syracuse, the game is decided by goals scored, not face-offs won.

Penalties in this game were few & far between: Syracuse was penalized once (and killed the EMO), while Bryant had three penalties, leading to one EMO goal for Syracuse.

Most other stats, except the aforementioned face-off margin, were pretty even. The one other exception was turnovers; Bryant lost the ball 18 times, compared to the seven mistakes by the Orange. Overall it was a rather clean game, played at a nice pace. There were several times when I felt the officials were slow to call stall warnings against Bryant, but the officials did eventually call them. I still don't get why the officials can't operate an on-field shot clock instead of having this invisible, theoretical 30-second shot clock upon calling the stall warning. But alas, I'm not a policy maker.

The win by the Orange earns them a spot in the quarterfinals, and a Saturday afternoon date in Maryland against Yale. If you want to see the updated bracket with the correct match-ups for this coming weekend, be sure to check out my bracket predictions from last week; I correctly chose the winner for all eight first-round games. Brian missed a couple games, but we can't all be perfect all the time.

Labels: Lacrosse, NCAA Tournament, Recap

Who will play on Memorial Day? We think a match-up you've already seen once or twice.

Last Sunday night was the NCAA Division I Men's Lacrosse selection show. It's probably not as exciting or well viewed as the basketball selection show each March to usher in March Madness, but as lacrosse continues to grow as a sport, this selection show and this tournament is getting more attention. The lacrosse tournament consists of 16 teams, with the top eight being seeded 1-8 and hosting first-round games on campus against one of the unseeded teams. Therefore, you don't see a 1-16, 2-15, etc., as geography typically plays into the match-ups. Syracuse earned the #1 seed, and will host the Bryant Bulldogs in the Carrier Dome on Sunday at 7:30pm. The winner then moves onto the quarterfinals in College Park, Maryland on May 18. The other quarterfinal site is Indianapolis, Indiana. The Final Four and Championship, over the Saturday and Monday of Memorial Day weekend, will be hosted in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, at Lincoln Financial Field.

As we are wont to do here at Orange::44, Brian and I have filled out our brackets with winners of each game, up through choosing an eventual National Champion. They look pretty similar, and have a bit of homerism, but we both think they're pretty solid brackets.

Here is Brian's bracket:

Labels: Brackets, Lacrosse, NCAA Tournament

Your favorite bloggers invade Atlanta!

In my 31 years on this Earth, I've had the privilege to attend two Final Fours. The first was in 2003 when I traveled to New Orleans as a member of the Sour Sitrus Society. That ended quite well. I thought for sure that Syracuse would make it back to New Orleans last year, but the Fab Melo suspension and the stunning officiating in the Elite Eight game against Ohio State prevented a sort of homecoming to the Big Easy. A month ago, when Syracuse lost to Louisville in the Big East Championship, I was certainly feeling a lot better about how Syracuse was playing, but still just didn't see a deep NCAA Tournament run. But this team, this 2013 iteration of the Syracuse Orange, decided to play some of its best ball of the season in late March. So when it earned the Final Four berth by winning the East Regional in Washington, I immediately went into planning mode; there was no way I was letting a Final Four trip pass me by!

Due to scheduling and prior commitments, Brian wasn't able to make it to Atlanta until Sunday, while I was able to fly down on Friday. This was my first time in Atlanta, and I was anxious to escape the cold, dreary weather of upstate New York. Friday was spent taking in some good eats and drinks away from downtown Atlanta with my good friends Cory and Adrienne, who were amazing hosts and earned themselves a shout-out on the blog. Saturday, though, was when we would really start to take in all of the Final Four festivities Atlanta had to offer. We made our way down to Centennial Olympic Park, which I would consider to be almost the centerpiece of the events of the weekend. Free concerts were offered there all weekend, with food, drink, and portable bathrooms all available. Definitely a music festival atmosphere. That afternoon, we arrived as Macklemore was performing. We caught that show, along with Ludacris shortly thereafter. I would have liked to stay for Flo Rida after that, but I had already gotten quite a bit of sun (as you can see in the above picture), and we needed to start the pregame meet-ups & imbibing at the Official Syracuse Pregame site, Hudson Grille. Luckily, this was essentially right outside one of the entrances of the Park; unfortunately, Hudson Grille was probably 500 people over capacity at that point. No matter; they crammed as many people inside and out on their front patio as could tolerate standing in tight quarters.

A round or two of beers (or, just killing the 12-pack I had to buy at the bar), and it was time to make our way into the Georgia Dome to catch the warm up: Louisville vs. Wichita State. My semifinal tickets were submitted to a flashseats.com site, where I simply had to swipe my credit card at the game and it printed out mini-tickets, really seat vouchers. Scary the first time you use it, because you don't want to be scammed, but it ended up being really convenient and we didn't have to worry about losing or forgetting the tickets. We made our way to our seats in Section 301, which ended up giving us a nice corner view of the court. And it struck me just how gigantic that Dome is. The Carrier Dome is tiny in comparison. This one rises much higher, and seats tens of thousands more.

For a "warm-up game" or the less desirable of the two semifinals, Louisville-Wichita State was a great game. The Shockers were in it to win it, and the entire Georgia Dome was cheering for them, save those clad in red. But as the Cardinals came back in the second half, and eventually gained the lead, those dressed in red really came alive and got LOUD! It was a good, exciting game to watch, and really got me pumped for the main event.

Syracuse - Michigan
The storylines coming into this game were: Jim Boeheim has never lost a national semifinal; John Beilein has never beaten Jim Boeheim; the Syracuse 2-3 zone has been suffocating high powered offenses; Trey Burke is pretty damn good. But once the tip goes up, none of that matters. The game is determined by what happens on that court during those 40 minutes. And what happened during those 40 minutes is that the Syracuse offense regressed back almost to what it was at the end of the regular season, when it was all gloom & doom. The defense kept the Orange in the game, but in the end, Syracuse had just dug itself too deep of a hole to climb out of, allowing Michigan to win 61-56.

• For Syracuse, this game belonged to CJ Fair. But for CJ, Syracuse is not in any sort of conversation to even have a chance to win in the last 90 seconds. But as it was, CJ scored a game-high 22 points on 9-20 shooting, 1-3 from three, six rebounds, a block, and a steal in 37 minutes. Not only was he the consistent CJ Fair we had seen all season, but he went above and beyond defensively. He got a lot of good looks, and that soft touch he has with the jumper or floater just makes you feel really good about his game play.
• Brandon Triche was such an enigma in this game. He'd have a good stretch or moments of greatness, but then other times just totally disappear or toss up a horrible shot or cough up a turnover. His final line: 11 points on 4-9 shooting, 0-2 from three, three rebounds, eight assists, and two turnovers in 39 minutes before fouling out to end his career at Syracuse. More on the fouls in a bit.
• Michael Carter-Williams was virtually a statistical ghost. Two points, five rebounds, two assists. Those are not point guard numbers. You look at CJ putting up all those points, but then you realize that he created his own scoring plays. MCW also fouled out after logging 35 minutes.
• James Southerland also mightily struggled offensively. That's probably an awful grammatical sentence, but it fits with James's contribution. Five points on 2-9 shooting, 1-5 from three. On the up side, he had the offensive highlight of the game for the Orange with that monster dunk. So, at least we have that.
• Christmas, Keita, Grant, and Cooney all saw some minutes, but nobody was really able to step up and take over the game. And that really cost Syracuse.
• People will debate for a long time how Boeheim handled the final minute of play, particularly faced with ultimately having both his starting guards foul out and having to rely on putting the ball in Trevor Cooney's inexperienced hands. Should Boeheim have called a timeout and drawn up a play before Brandon fouled out? If that final play was designed to get Southerland a look for a three point shot, should more have been done to get him open before Trevor drove to the basket? Fact is, it happened how it happened, and we fans have to live with it; I'm sure the final outcome hurt the players whose sweat was on that court a lot more than it hurt us watching in the stands or on TV.
• By and large, the zone did its job. The prolific Wolverine offense was held to 61 points, and faced the same struggles that most teams face against the zone. Their shooters did a great job of extending the zone, opening up room in the middle, but those outside and middle shots are still tough shots to hit. Michigan shot only 39.6% from the field, and 33.3% from three.
• Syracuse shot 41.8% from the field, but only 21.4% from three. That, my friends, is probably the game changer. Hit a few more of those shots, and Syracuse is fighting to hold onto the lead at the end, instead of fighting to get it.
• From my seat in 301, I didn't think the officiating was horrible. There are always going to be some questionable calls, but nothing I saw from way up there made me think that the refs altered the outcome of the game. A few days ago I rewatched the game on my DVR, and I still feel that way. They missed a few calls, and had a part in Brandon & MCW fouling out, but it wasn't so atrocious that we should be up in arms as a fan base. More simply put, it was not Syracuse vs. Ohio State in the Elite Eight last year. Syracuse was in this game -- a 3-pointer away from tying it when a timeout was taken with 15 seconds left -- so you can put the loss on Syracuse's lack of execution, not on a call that should have gone Syracuse's way.

Labels: Atlanta, Basketball, Farewell Big East Basketball, Final Four, NCAA Tournament

Labels: Basketball, NCAA Tournament, Preview

This looks beautiful, especially at the Verizon Center!

Sorry, guys. I know we're a full week after the Indiana game, and five says since the Marquette game. Travelling back from Washington, Easter festivities, catching up from last week, and preparing to be gone for the Final Four have left little time to recap the games. But, since this has to be documented, and since I was there at the Verizon Center for the crazy shenanigans, I owe it to the loyal readers of this blog to share my thoughts. So, enjoy:

Indiana
All of the pregame hype was all about Keith Smart and 1987. But that was 26 years ago, not now. Now, Syracuse had to deal with one of the best offensive teams in college basketball this season. That's what I had on my mind as I entered by seat in section 419 in the Verizon Center. That Hoosier offense never really showed up. Probably because the Syracuse defense did. The vaunted Syracuse 2-3 zone has received a lot of attention this tournament (much as it did in 2003), but it was especially so after the Indiana game. The Orange was constantly forcing turnovers, running the floor, and scoring. It was the perfect recipe that led to a Syracuse win over Indiana, 61-50.

• Michael. Carter. -Williams. He picked a pretty big stage to have the game of his life. 24 points on 9-19 shooting, 3-6 from three, five rebounds, four steals.
• Obviously the big stat there was 24 points. He only had one assist. So, as the point guard, he was seeing something that he liked, something that he had to exploit. That, of course, was the great height advantage he and Brandon Triche had on the Hoosier guards. With the Syracuse forwards spreading out the Indiana defense, lanes opened up for MCW & Triche to drive the lane or even shoot over the guards.
• Brandon had a great game as well, with 14 points on 6-12 shooting, with four rebounds. He did have six turnovers, but when your backcourt gives you 38 points, you tend to forgive some things.
• CJ Fair was CJ Fair. Again. I literally should just copy and paste my comments about CJ from game to game, make the occasional stat change as necessary. This one was eleven points on 4-10 shooting, nine rebounds, two blocks, and two steals.
• MCW, Triche, and Fair all played 38 minutes.
• Rakeem Christmas didn't contribute much in his nine minutes, though his height and length had Indiana scratching their heads in the middle of the zone.
• The rest of those center minutes went to Baye Moussa Keita, who went 3-4 from the line, grabbed three rebounds, blocked two shots and had two steals.
• Syracuse had 13 points off turnovers, and 30 points in the paint.
• Both teams got off to a slow start offensively, but once the Orange took the lead 4-3 with a fastbreak Brandon Triche dunk at 16:18 in the first half, they never looked back and never relinquished the lead. Impressive.

Labels: Basketball, NCAA Tournament, Recap