Syracuse Basketball: Despite what Joe Lunardi says SU is a tourney team

The Syracuse basketball squad will have a reshaped roster in 2019-20, and one prominent bracketologist has SU out of the field at this juncture.

The Syracuse basketball team, whether rising junior forward Oshae Brissett elects to return or not, will possess a markedly different starting line-up in the 2019-20 term, along with a deeper bench and, hopefully, a more fluid offense.

Expectations might prove lower than in 2018-19, which is fine by me, and personally I think next season’s crew could amount to a really fun and successful group.

Unsurprisingly, many national pundits, at least for now, aren’t super high on the ‘Cuse, and for legitimate reasons. The Orange got bounced in the first round of the 2019 Big Dance. Point guard Frank Howard and wing Tyus Battle are gone. The same may hold true for Brissett. A promising five-member recruiting class arrives on the Hill this fall, but head coach Jim Boeheim and his assistants are also charged with leading a relatively young unit that includes 13 scholarship players – and no seniors.

I ultimately believe that, in 2019-20, Syracuse will reach March Madness and actually advance beyond the round of 64. However, it doesn’t shock me for collegiate-hoops experts to not feel all that jazzed about SU as it currently stands. To that end, well-known bracketologist Joe Lunardi of ESPN released his most-recent mock cadre of 68 earlier this week, and the ‘Cuse barely missed the cut. Lunardi slotted the Orange in the “first four out” category. Others in that subset are – sigh – Georgetown, as well as Alabama, led by former Buffalo head coach Nate Oats, and Colorado.

Lunardi, at present, envisions seven Atlantic Coast Conference members in the 2020 NCAA Tournament. Duke and North Carolina, just like in the 2019 Big Dance, are No. 1 seeds. Louisville, which has a top-10 recruiting class coming in, is a No. 2 seed. Virginia, the defending national champions, is a No. 3 seed, which I get because the Cavaliers are losing several key guys from this past April’s title run to the NBA Draft. Florida State and N.C. State are No. 8 seeds, while Clemson is a No. 11 seed, part of the “last four in” batch.

From a league perspective, the Big Ten, at nine, and the Big 12, at eight, eclipse the ACC. Washington, whose boss is former Syracuse assistant coach Mike Hopkins, lands a No. 12 seed. Other than the Blue Devils and the Tar Heels, the two remaining No. 1 seeds are Kentucky and Michigan State. The bevy of industry prognosticators deem that the Spartans will begin the 2019-20 campaign as the No. 1 squad in the pre-season polls.

These way-too-early projected brackets and top-25 rankings are somewhat silly, because the upcoming stanza is months away, recruiting isn’t done, and the NBA Draft has yet to occur. But they also spark interesting conversations and debates. Lunardi’s field will evolve over and over again, and I anticipate that SU will find itself on the right side of the bubble once competition commences.