Syracuse Basketball: Top 3 games at the Carrier Dome
By Thomas Clark
Syracuse 83, Villanova 80, Triple OT.
The Dome had only been open for six months.
The Big East Conference was only a year old.
It was just the second Big East Conference tournament, before Madison Square Garden became its permanent home.
Big East Commissioner Dave Gavitt had brought the tourney to Syracuse, and the Dome.
And despite a subpar 16-11 regular season, Syracuse, playing in the tournament at home as a 6-seed, had advanced past St. John’s (No. 3) and Georgetown (No. 2) to face Villanova in the championship game.
A crowd of 15,213 fans came for the game, which sounds preposterously low now, but at the time it seemed about right given the fact no one was conditioned to see even more than 10,000, the maximum capacity at the Orangemen’s previous home Manley Field House.
The game was back and forth. Syracuse basketball was filled with likable, exciting, but young players like sophomores Leo Rautins, Erich Santifer and Tony Bruin around senior center Danny Schayes.
The Orangemen and Wildcats were tied, 62-62 at the end of regulation. Tied at 70 after the first OT (after Syracuse fell behind by 6 only to come back), tied at 78 after the second OT (after Villanova came back from behind down 4 with one minute remaining).
Finally, in the third overtime, Rautins tipped in the winning basket after a Santifer miss, and the place went nuts. The Dome crowds back then were crazy: vulgar, sometimes a bit violent, always passionate.
The game put the Carrier Dome on the map.
Back then, the Big East Tournament champion did not get an automatic berth into the NCAA Tournament, and despite Boeheim saying his team belonged in the NCAA, where they had been the previous 8 years, 1981 ended up being the biggest NCAA snub we ever endured.
The team had to go to the NIT where it reached the title game, but it will always be defined by that classic photo of Rautins under the basket, having won the Big East Tournament at the Carrier Dome, with a tip-in.
Next time, Part 5: Top 3 shot blockers.
Next. Syracuse Basketball: Keifer Sykes and teammates honorary Orange for life. dark