For the first time since 1987, Jim Boeheim has lost to the same team three times in a single season after Syracuse basketball fell to Pittsburgh 72-71 in the ACC Tournament.
It was a frustrating game for Syracuse basketball fans, as the Orange came out hot before completely falling apart for the middle portion of the game. Then the Orange came back, only to quickly find themselves down 12 late, and they came back yet again to tie things at 68 apiece with 1:24 left.
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But a bad turnover by Frank Howard and a missed shot by Trevor Cooney sealed Syracuse basketball’s fate. In what was an extremely noteworthy and bizarre absence for more than 10 minutes, Trevor Cooney returned to the game right at the end to get the final shot, only to leave it short. And in an instant, Syracuse basketball finds itself eliminated from the ACC Tournament.
Not only that, but at 19-13, the Orange find themselves almost certainly on the wrong side of the bubble. Sure, right now Joe Lunardi has Syracuse as one of his last four teams to make the NCAA Tournament field, but the chances of no movement through the rest of tournament week are slim to none, making it incredibly difficult for Syracuse basketball to sneak in, and even if they do, they’ll likely find themselves in Dayton for a play-in game.
As usual, a couple of relative nobodies did the most damage against the Syracuse zone, which seems to be a genuine trend. Cam Johnson, who averages 4.3 points-per-game, scored a career-high 24, and Ryan Luther, who typically chips in 5.0 points-per-game, added 13 as Pittsburgh’s depth provided a huge advantage.
Today’s loss was really a microcosm of the problems that have been plaguing Syracuse basketball throughout the year, most notably the team’s wild inconsistency and over-reliance on its seniors, in particular Michael Gbinije. Gbinije carried the team in the first half, along with a strong performance from Dajuan Coleman. A big part of the reason the Orange found themselves down by double digits more than once in the game was the fact that outside of Gbinije, there was simply no offense. The senior finished the game with 24 points.
Of course, some of that turned around a bit late in the game when Howard got extended minutes and Syracuse started turning the Panthers over, leading to breakout opportunities and easier baskets. That’s what helped the Orange come back from being down 66-54 to being tied at 68 with 84 ticks left on the clock.
But with the ball and a tie game, Howard telegraphed a pass on the wing to Gbinije, which was in turn intercepted by Pitt and quickly led to two points that put Pitt back in control down the stretch. The lesson to be taken from the game, really, is that this has been a one-man team, and it’s perhaps fitting that this has become so readily apparent now, coinciding with the 10th anniversary of Gerry McNamara’s magical run through the Big East Tournament.
The difference here is that McNamara had more help than Jim Boeheim liked to let on. Gbinije, however, was saddled with players who disappeared for long stretches. Now, in fairness to Tyler Roberson, he was sidelined with some pretty questionable fouls today, including a third foul that kept him out for much of the second half despite the fact that he quite literally wasn’t within 10 feet of the play, as replays showed. Still, Roberson had just two rebounds to go along with four points, and put the burden on the interior almost entirely on Coleman and Tyler Lydon.
Coleman answered the bell nicely, scoring 11 points and grabbing 11 rebounds, but showed time and again that he’s doomed to make the same kinds of mistakes you’d have expected him to get out of his system as a freshman. Unfortunately, being injured for so long seems to have stunted his development in the post, and he’s still out there getting the ball stripped and failing to finish the kinds of bunnies you’d expect a 6-foot-9, 265 pound man to flush.
Before the game, I went on Twitter and talked about how important it would be for Roberson and Malachi Richardson to step up against Pitt. Both have struggled recently, and in particular they’ve struggled against Pitt this year. Today, things didn’t really turn around, and that’s a big part of the reason Syracuse lost its first half lead and, eventually, the game.
In the first half, Richardson had two points, two turnovers, and zero rebounds, and Roberson didn’t fair much better. I mentioned Roberson’s two rebound performance, but at least Richardson showed up when it came to knocking down some clutch shots in the second half. The freshman finished with 13 points, hitting 2-of-4 threes in the game.
The big questions to emerge from this one are 1) where does Syracuse go from here, and 2) what the heck was going on with Trevor Cooney? For the Orange, it’s likely a trip to the NIT and the hope that they can get to 20 victories. In all his time on the sidelines at Syracuse basketball, Jim Boeheim has never had fewer than 20 wins two straight years. Last season, the Orange won 18. This year, they’re sitting on 19. We could be seeing a bad kind of history unfolding here.
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As far as Cooney is concerned, Boeheim said after the game that his senior was not hurt, so the fact that he found himself on the bench for much of the second half remains a bit of a mystery. Now, keep in mind that the offense seemed to be flowing a bit better with Howard on the floor, and there was a certain energy that was lacking before the change was made. So it could simply have been a case where Boeheim didn’t want to mess with a good thing, and the fact is the Cooney-less rotation was producing.
Still, it was a strange way to end things as we head toward either an NIT berth or, if the committee decides to look beyond the 4-5 stretch with Boeheim on suspension, a 10 or 11 seed in the NCAA Tournament. You had a feeling that, when Cooney checked back into the game with only eight seconds remaining and the Orange down one, he’d somehow wind up with the final shot.
And that’s what happened, as Pitt double-teamed Gbinije, and Cooney charged down the court, heaving an off balance three point attempt that glanced off the rim. A fitting, frustrating end for an equally frustrating game.