Syracuse Basketball: Big man Maliq Brown is on a tear, and he should be starting

Maliq Brown, the sophomore power forward/center out of Culpeper, Va., is playing at an ultra-high level these days for Syracuse basketball.

The 6-foot-8 Brown, on Tuesday night in Durham, N.C., tallied a career-high 26 points on 11-of-16 shooting from the field to go along with seven rebounds, although the Orange (10-4, 1-2 in the ACC) fell by 20 points, 86-66, to No. 14 Duke on the road.

I don’t get too fixated on which players start versus which players come off the bench, because it’s all about which players are logging the most minutes, particularly in crunch time.

Against the Blue Devils, Brown earned 32 minutes of court time. On the ‘Cuse roster, in the setback to Duke, the only Syracuse basketball players to see more court action were starters Judah Mintz, a sophomore point guard, and J.J. Starling, a sophomore guard.

By and large in the 2023-24 season to date, head coach Adrian Autry has inserted junior Naheem McLeod as the team’s starting center. However, at this juncture in 2023-24, Brown is averaging 23.5 minutes per game, as compared to 14.4 minutes per encounter for McLeod.

Sophomore big Maliq Brown is playing quite well of late for Syracuse basketball.

Per ESPN data, through the Orange’s first 14 games, Brown is averaging 23.5 minutes, 9.7 points, 5.7 rebounds, 0.7 assists, 0.6 blocks and 2.1 steals per contest.

He is making 73.8 percent from the field, 40.0 percent (2-of-5) from beyond the arc, and 88.9 percent from the charity stripe.

Over the past five games, the ‘Cuse has defeated Georgetown on the road, Oregon on a neutral floor, and Niagara and Pittsburgh at home, while losing at Duke.

In those five meetings, Syracuse basketball has gone 4-1. Brown, over that stretch, is averaging 15.4 points and 6.4 rebounds per game, while connecting on an impressive 75.6 percent from the field as a whole.

Brown’s recent play has proven critical. McLeod hasn’t been super impactful. Junior forward Benny Williams was great against Pitt, but he’s been up and down. In recent games, fellow wings/forwards Justin Taylor and Chris Bell, both sophomores, haven’t been all that effective.

Mintz continues to put up big numbers. Starling is solid. Sophomore guard/wing Quadir Copeland has been strong in several recent games, although he struggled at Duke.

My point here is that Brown’s performances of late have helped lead the Orange to multiple wins. He should be starting. But those are semantics. He’s playing in crunch time, and Brown has come up huge in some important moments.