We got a chance to sitdown with the play-by-play Voice of the Syracuse Women’s Basketball team, Brian Higgins on Inside The Loud House.
These are special times for the Syracuse Women’s Basketball squad. They’re are coming off their best year in program history making it to the National Championship game.
This season they’re attempting an encore performance. Currently they’re in the top-25 for both the AP poll and the coaches poll with a 18-9 record.
We decided to sitdown with the Voice of the Syracuse Women’s Basketball team, Brian Higgins, to talk about the current state of affairs with the team, their record breaking attendance from the other night, and more!
Brian Higgins is also the Syracuse football host and sideline reporter for Syracuse IMG Sports. On top of those responsibilities, he’s also the play-by-play Voice for the Syracuse Men’s Lacrosse team. You can follow him on Twitter @BrianHigginsSU, without further adieu lets get this started!
"Paul A. Esden Jr. (@BoyGreen25): 11,021 fans were in attendance on Sunday. The previous record was 4,367. It seemed like the increased advertising campaign heavily contributed to the final results. We talked before the game, how surprised were you at the final metric?"
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"Brian Higgins (@BrianHigginsSU): I knew going in there would be a record crowd for sure, but 11K more than pleasantly surprised me. 7 or 8 thousand would have been quite impressive so to see what a crowd that big for women’s basketball in the Carrier Dome can look and sound like was a lot of fun. Full credit to all involved in marketing and ticket sales for the game, and it was great to see people not just show up but really get into the action."
"Paul A. Esden Jr. (@BoyGreen25): There was a lot of pressure on the ladies to perform with the increased attendance and they showed up in a big way. While they didn’t get the win, they did seem to make an impact with the fans who showed up, is it realistic to think we’ll see a large portion of those fans returning in the near future?"
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"Brian Higgins (@BrianHigginsSU): Averaging a crowd that size would be nearly unheard of in women’s basketball, only South Carolina averages more than what showed up to the Carrier Dome on Sunday. But to all that came, know that it meant something and helped the team. I’d urge everyone who was there and had a a good time, which best I can tell was most of the crowd, to come back and do it again. Based on my travels with the Orange, the best teams in women’s hoops generally have the best fan bases. So who cares which is the chicken and the egg in this scenario, it would be great to have both the team and attendance in the upper echelon in the country."
"Paul A. Esden Jr. (@BoyGreen25): Brian getting away from the SU Women for just a moment, you do a number of different broadcasts from Lacrosse, to some Football, do you have a favorite sport to be involved in? Or do you just enjoy a lot of different sports?"
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"Brian Higgins (@BrianHigginsSU): Whichever is in season works for me. The run to the final four with women’s hoops last year was personally special because of how much time you spend with that group over the course of a season. But I’ll also never forget the unbelievable finish to the 2009 lacrosse title game against Cornell or Macky MacPherson doing snow angels at the Pinstripe Bowl. It’s all really in context of the moment."
"Paul A. Esden Jr. (@BoyGreen25): Getting back to the SU Women, does Coach Q get enough credit for the job he has done with the women over the last decade plus?"
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"Brian Higgins (@BrianHigginsSU): Coach Q won one conference coach of the year award in his first 10 seasons, back in his second year in 2008. His team’s have finished higher than projected in the Big East or ACC in each of the previous four seasons. It’s good to consistently exceed expectations, but hopefully at some point the accolades will follow."
"Paul A. Esden Jr. (@BoyGreen25): One final question, you’ve watched this team obviously all season long. You were apart of the Final Four run last season, does it feel like this team is going to make another deep tournament run? What’s the floor ceiling of this team in your opinion?"
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"Brian Higgins (@BrianHigginsSU): The big difference between last year and this year is last year’s team had more depth. Having Cornelia Fondren, Maggie Morrison and Taylor Ford off the bench and of course Brianna Butler made it so not everyone had to have an A+ game every time out. This season the Orange still have a high max level, but the floor is lower as well. But close and late in a high pressure tournament game very few teams have what Syracuse does in two players that can go get a bucket in Alexis Peterson and Brittney Sykes."