Syracuse basketball has plenty of time to get back into the tournament mix

Syracuse basketball may be off to their worst start in the Jim Boeheim era, but there’s still plenty of time to turn it around. Here are the details.

Things do not get easier for the Syracuse basketball team as they head into their second early-season conference game. The Orange have to take care of Georgia Tech if they don’t want to fall to under .500 and if they want to remain in the bubble conversation for March Madness.

The current resume for the Orange does not look too great.

Syracuse has dropped their last three contests; all to Power 5 teams and all by double digits. We all knew that Syracuse was in for a tough road to begin the season but accumulating losses against this competition isn’t going to help a team with eyes on the NCAA Tournament.

"According to ESPN’s Joe Lunardi, only three of Syracuse’s opponents so far this season are projected as NCAA Tournament teams as of December 2nd."

The Yellow Jackets will not add to the list as the ACC surprisingly only has five projected teams in the field as of early December. This is an indication of how top-heavy the ACC is with all five being projected as a four seed or better.

Looking at the bottom half of the bracket you will see a lot of fluidity. Penn State who lost a lead late to Ole Miss before beating Syracuse is currently comfortably in even with Ole Miss looking out at and Oklahoma State who won the NIT Tip-off Tournament as one of the last four byes.

With so many teams out there who have yet to hit their stride or truly be challenged, the bubble will be evolving all season long. Avoiding bad losses for Syracuse will be important and so far, even though the eye test does not look great, the Orange have avoided a loss that will be held against them as a red flag come Selection Sunday.

Syracuse’s four losses come against teams that are in the top 34 of the Basketball Power Index.

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However, the Orange’s four wins might even be considered less impressive than their losses. Colgate is the highest-rated team via BPI, and they sit at 154th. The other three; Seattle (222), Bucknell (253), and Cornell (297), are all well outside the top 200.

For Syracuse to make a case for themselves as an NCAA Tournament team, they will need to start beating top 50 opponents.

There are many more of them on the Syracuse schedule but plenty of opportunities where they could have devastating slipups. The average BPI rank of Syracuse’s remaining schedule is 84.

They will play 9 of their final 23 games against teams currently in the top 50. Only four of them will be at home. Five other games will be played by teams with a current BPI rank of 100 or worst. That leaves 10 games currently scheduled with teams ranked 51-99.

Winning as many of those 10 games as possible could set Syracuse up to differentiate themselves from others on the bubble. Of these 10 games, three certainly stand out as resume builders on the road:

At Virginia Tech on January 18th, At Clemson January 28th, and at Miami to finish the regular season on March 7th. The Hokies are currently 63rd, the Tigers 64th and the Hurricanes 62nd in BPI.

If these teams hold their spots in this area or improve they could be top 75 teams in the Net Rankings. That means these three will be Quadrant One games for Syracuse. That will be 16 potential Quadrant One games on their schedule as it stands December 4th, with 12 left to play giving the Orange plenty of time to make up ground.

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Syracuse is ranked 73rd in BPI. That is only ahead of five other teams and leaves Syracuse 10th in the ACC. To make the tournament Syracuse will need to increase their standing in the rankings and knock off the teams not only behind them but in front of them.

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