Syracuse Basketball: Poor play causes Orange to falter vs Georgetown

Syracuse basketball falls flat vs Georgetown on Saturday. Here are the lowlights and why the Orange faltered on the road.

Syracuse basketball had their chances vs Georgetown, but ultimately a late Buddy Boeheim rally wasn’t enough. Here’s how it all played out.

First half

Georgetown returned home after a two-game road trip and carried that momentum into the game vs the Orange. Syracuse was able to survive the early troubles to get right back into the game.

Elijah Hughes continued his hot play but the player that rose to the occasion was Marek Dolezaj. He got some tough looks inside and converted those buckets. Arguably he could’ve had a few and-one opportunities but the referees swallowed their whistle.

Although after a back and forth affair there was a clear momentum shift that happened late in the second half that turned the tide.

Elijah Hughes hit a three that initially put the Orange up 37-36 but a late whistle waved it off and instead the Hoyas scored five straight buckets to make it 41-34. Then the Hoyas sprinkled in some Mac McClung magic to extend the lead to 12 heading into the half.

All in all the Hoyas closed the half on a 14-2 run.

First-half takeaways:

• Elijah Hughes had 18 first-half points (7-of-11 from the floor, 3-of-5 from deep).
• Syracuse only had four players score in the first half. While on the other side of the coin, the Hoyas had six players score with a limited roster (only seven scholarship players).
• Hoyas got to the line 19 times, the Orange only got there three times.

Second half

After a lackluster finish to the first half, the Orange finally started showing signs of life as they cut the Hoyas deficit to single digits making it a 57-48 score with 13 minutes remaining in the contest.

Joe Girard III, New York’s all-time leading scorer as a high schooler showed why he was so highly regarded as a recruit.

While on the other side of the coin Bourama Sidibe just wasn’t effective and caused more problems than solutions. It forced Jim Boeheim to put Jesse Edwards into the game to try and find a spark in the middle.

Georgetown continued to make it rain from deep and the Orange simply didn’t have any answers. Syracuse tried to go full press to make up the difference and the Hoyas responded beautifully.

Similarly to the Georgia Tech game, Buddy Boeheim had a slow first half and then turned it on late.

Buddy scored 25 points (7-of-13 from beyond the arc) and narrowed the gap to single digits late, but it was too little too late. All of his points came in the second half, but his running mate Elijah Hughes was invisible in the second half.

After scoring 18 in the first stanza, Hughes was held to just a measly three points in the second half. Syracuse ended up losing 89-79 to snap their one-game winning streak.

Final takeaways:

• Syracuse shot 48 percent from the field and found a way to lose.
• The Orange shot nine free throws in the game while the Hoyas earned 31 attempts from the line.
• This leads to the obvious, Syracuse got into foul trouble early and often. Some of it was padded by the foul game at the end.

Up next the Orange will return to the dome on Wednesday to play the Oakland Golden Grizzlies at 8:00 p.m.