Syracuse basketball will host red-hot No. 2 Duke on Wednesday night. As you can probably imagine, odds-makers don't give the Orange much of a chance to stun the Blue Devils.
When I wrote this article, FanDuel had Duke as a massive 17.5-point betting favorite in its Atlantic Coast Conference clash with the 'Cuse at the JMA Wireless Dome. The over/under was set at 142.5 points.
By extension, at the time of this writing, ESPN Analytics said that the Blue Devils had a whopping 92.9 percent chance to beat Syracuse basketball on the road this Wednesday evening.
Of course, I'm not much of a betting person myself, so I don't care too much about the odds. That being said, Duke is an overwhelming favorite, and the Orange will have to be nearly perfect to shock the country's second-best squad.
Syracuse basketball is a huge betting underdog versus Duke on the Hill.
Entering this ACC affair, the Blue Devils (19-2, 11-0 in the ACC) have won 15 straight, and their only two losses are by a combined eight points to a pair of top-20 teams. Yikes.
The 'Cuse (10-12, 4-7 in the ACC) did pick up a solid win at California last Saturday night, yet the Orange has an awful NCAA NET ranking of No. 134 overall, as compared to No. 2 for Duke, which at this point in the 2024-25 term is a significant contender to earn the No. 1 overall seed in this spring's NCAA Tournament.
When it beat Cal, Syracuse basketball notched its first quadrant-two victory. The Orange doesn't have any quad-one triumphs, although an upset of the Blue Devils would give the 'Cuse its first in that category.
For all of 2024-25, Syracuse basketball is a combined 1-11 in quadrant-one/quadrant-two contests, while in quadrant-three/quadrant-four encounters, the Orange is a combined 9-1. Therein lies the issue for the 'Cuse this stanza.
Simply put, the Orange struggles against stronger opponents. Granted, junior guard J.J. Starling was out for seven games earlier in 2024-25 due to an injury, and now freshman power forward Donnie Freeman has missed the past eight contests because of an injury.
That's tough to overcome, as Starling is the team's best player, and before he got hurt, Freeman was the leading rebounder for Syracuse basketball this term.
Look, I'm not expecting the 'Cuse to prevail over Duke. I'll take off my Orange-colored glasses for a second and be a realist. Then again, stranger things have happened.
It's been years since Syracuse basketball beat the Blue Devils. So maybe the Orange is due. To me, though, short of a massive upset win, I'd love to see the 'Cuse play well on both ends of the floor and make this a competitive contest. I hope that's not asking too much.