Early Season Dominance

Syracuse is off to a 12-0, the best start since the school went 19-0 in the 1999-2000 season. They are the 10th Orangemen squad to start out the season with twelve wins. I covered all the fast starts in Syracuse basketball a few years ago, so I won’t readdress the issue now. As I had mentioned a few days ago, I was in the process of putting together new information on OrangeHoops.org regarding Syracuse’s performance against ranked teams, and that is now completed.

I’m sure it seems Syracuse is always off to a fast start under Jim Boeheim. And that is not an illusion. With Syracuse’s win tonight against Oakland, the Orangemen are 308-38 in November and December under Boeheim. That’s an 89% winning percentage.

Boeheim’s critics will point out that as evidence of how inflated his record is. It is true that Syracuse does play its share of ‘easy’ games in November and December, just like every other major Division I school. However, it is not true that Boeheim’s winning percentage in these two months is solely the result of playing the easier competition. Syracuse has an outstanding record against ranked teams in November and December. The Orangemen are 22-13 versus top 25 teams in those two months; since the 1988-89 season he is 20-7 versus top 25 teams in the first two months.

Folks, that’s an outstanding number. If you are winning half of your games against Top 25 teams on a regular basis, you are doing an outstanding job. Syracuse has been 11-4 in November, and 11-9 in December against the Top 25. The fact is the Orange win in November and December, regardless of who they play. They have some aberrations (a Cleveland State here, a Drexel there). But you get the point.

Now I realize it is only what you accomplish in March that really matters. But Boeheim does have a National Championship and three Final Fours under his belt. Few coaches have that. And in his three championship games he coached against Bobby Knight, Rick Pitino and Roy Williams. That’s a trio of Hall of Famers he met in the title game.

Overall, Boeheim is 111-123 versus Top 25 teams. Against the best teams in the country, he’s winning 47% of his games. The Orangemen are 46-61 against the Top 10 teams in the Boeheim era. They are winning 43% of their games against the best 10 teams in the country. The Orangemen in that same time span are 17-39 against the Top 5 teams in the country. So when a Boeheim coached team plays one of the five best teams in the country, they’ll win 30% of the time. Basically, they have a one in three chance against the best of the best. I think you have to be pretty good to win at that level.

Boeheim coached teams are 65-78 versus teams ranked higher than the Orangemen (since 1986-87 they are 55-58 against that group). They are winning 45% of the games, on a regular basis, against teams reportedly ranked better than the Orangemen (and this includes when the Orange weren’t ranked and their opposition was). So Jim Boeheim teams are almost even money in games against the better team.

Overall, Jim Boeheim has coached against 287 Top 25 teams. His squad has been ranked in 676 games of the 1099 games he has coached.

Look, Boeheim has his coaching flaws. And his teams have lost some games we thought they were locks in. But they have also won several games they were not supposed to win.

As a side note, I thought there was some interesting ranking information regarding all four of Syracuse’s Final Fours. The 1974-75 squad was never ranked during the regular season; the AP named them #20 during the first round of the NCAA tournament. The 1986-87 team started the season out at #15; they were #10 entering the NCAA tournament. They would be #2 ranked North Carolina in the tournament, and lost eventually by a basket to the #3 ranked Indiana Hoosiers.

The 2005-2006 Orangemen were not ranked to start the season, and reach the Top 25 on December 15th. They would beat #4 ranked Kansas in the tournament, and lose to #2 ranked Kentucky in the final.

The 2002-2003 Orangemen were not ranked to start the season, and would not enter the Top 25 until January 18th. They would beat #3 Oklahoma, #5 Texas and #6 Kansas to win the National Championship.

So being unranked in November, like this year, can lead to a nice ending. Let’s hope so.

New Feature @ OrangeHoops on Ranked Teams

I have been working recently on a new feature at OrangeHoops that will show Syracuse’s all-time record versus AP Ranked Teams and each Syracuse coach’s individual record. I am also updating the game results pages of OrangeHoops to show the ranking of Syracuse and their opponent for each game.

I have not finished this feature yet; it is a somewhat slow process of getting the data, and updating each page as I translate the results. However, I wanted to announce this early as I have been receiving a lot of questions from loyal Syracuse fans (and readers!) on Syracuse’s performance with regards to ranked teams. I’ve completed the data from the 1948-1949 season through the 1995-1996 season. As a footnote, AP weekly voting did not start until 1948-49.

Once I’ve finished this ‘small’ project, I’ll do some of my customary analysis and commentary. But I wanted to get some of this information out to you all now, as the existing data will help answer many questions.

Just to wet your appetite, here are some highlights in Syracuse basketball history regarding ranked teams:

Syracuse first played a ranked team on February 9, 1949 when they played #20 Duquesne. Syracuse beat the Dukes 65-58 that day. Jack Kiley would lead Syracuse with 21 points.

Syracuse first played the #1 ranked team on March 13th, 1950 versus Bradley in the NIT. Bradley would win that game 78-66, and that would be the last game coached by Lew Andreas who retired after 25 years. As a side note, if you have ever wondered why there are references to the NIT once being as important as the NCAA, take note that Syracuse was playing the #1 team in the country in the post-season NIT. In other words, the #1 ranked team was not even in the NCAA tournament in 1950.

Syracuse’s first win against a Top 10 team occurred the next year, as Syracuse beat #8 Bradley 76-75 on March 31, 1951 to win the National Campus Tournament Championship (a third post season tournament that only hung around for a couple of years). Syracuse would trail in that game 18-0, before making a remarkable comeback. Jack Kiley would lead Syracuse with 12 points.

Syracuse’s first win against a Top 5 team did not occur until March 1, 1983 against Villanova, when the Orangemen beat the #4 Wildcats 79-70 at the Carrier Dome. Erich Santifer would lead the Orangemen with 21 pts.

Syracuse’s first win against a #1 Team was on January 28, 1985 against Georgetown. Syracuse beat the Hoyas 65-63. Rafael Addison would lead the Orangemen with 26 points.

The first time Syracuse was ranked #1 was the 1987-1988 preseason ranking. Syracuse would play #3 ranked North Carolina in the Tip Off classic, and lose a close one 96-93. Rony Seikaly would lead the Orangemen in scoring with 23 points.

The Orangemen were ranked #1 for 11 games over 6 weeks in 1989-1990, from November 27th until January 8th. They started that year at #3 in the preseason poll, but moved to #1 before playing any games as #1 Missouri and #2 LSU lost early November games. Their last game as a #1 ranked team was on January 6th, 1990 versus the unranked Villanova Wildcats. The Orangemen lost that game 93-74.

The last time Syracuse beat a #1 team was on March 7, 2006 when the beat Connecticut on their historic Big East Title run, with the Orangemen winning four games in four days to take the title by Gerry McNamara’s MVP performance.

A Win over Florida

The Orange are now 9-0, having knocked off their third top 15 team of the season. The Orange should go to 12-0 before the start of the Big East season on December 29th, but of course, upsets do happen. It was only a year ago that a 9-0 Syracuse team did lose to Cleveland State, at home.

I had mentioned three years ago that there were fifteen teams in Syracuse history to start a season 10-0. A win over St. Francis will make this year’s squad the 16th to accomplish that feat. Brandon Triche’s cousin Jason Hart was the starting point guard on the last Syracuse squad to win its first ten games, the 1999-2000 squad. That team would eventually go 19-0 before losing its first game.

Brandon Triche’s uncle, Howard, would help the Orangemen start out 15-0 in the 1986-1987 season. Only a jump shot by Keith Smart in the final seconds prevented the Orangemen from winning the National Championship that year. And Andy Rautins' father, Leo, help lead the 1982-1983 Orangemen to an 11-0 start.

Speaking of Andy Rautins, he is simply putting up some amazing statistics early in this season, despite playing only about 24 minutes a game. Rautins now has 49 assists and 19 turnovers after the first nine games of the season. Now keep in mind that Andy Rautins is a shooting guard, a guy who many thought was too slow and too weak to play major Division I basketball. He is on pace for roughly 200 assists for the season, with 80 turnovers, a 2.6 assist to turnover ratio. If Rautins were playing 39-40 minutes a game, he would be averaging about 9 assists a game. Jonny Flynn last season, playing 39-40 minutes a game, had 6.7 assists per game, and a turnover/assist ratio around 2.0.

Rautins is shooting 48% from three point range, 25-52, after having an off-night going 2-7 against Florida. He had no steals, which was unusual for this season for him; Rautins has 30 steals for the season. Jonny Flynn led the Orange last season with 54 steals, for the entire 38 game season. Rautins current pace puts him at around 120 steals for the year. The Syracuse record is 101 by James Thues in 2001-02. And keep in mind, that Rautins is only playing 24 minutes a game right now.

I don’t anticipate those numbers to hold up all season, but it really points out how well Rautins has been doing.

Rick Jackson had an outstanding first half last night. I love the fact that Syracuse is feeding the ball inside to Jackson and Onuaku this year. Good things happen when you offensively get the ball near the hoop. Offensive rebounds happen (Syracuse had 16 last night), opposing defensive players get in foul trouble, and the perimeter shooters get open looks. I like how Kris Joseph is defining his own role as the fast wing player who plays when the Orange need speed over size (Onuaku, sit down). Another stellar night by Wes Johnson (17 pts, 10 rebounds).

The Orange are fun to watch this year. They are playing a good brand of team basketball right now, and I hope that attitude stays with the squad all season long.

By the way, the Florida game is a neutral court game as it was part of the SEC/Big East Challenge, and was played on neither school’s home court. It’s not like the University of Florida is anywhere near Tampa; it’s a massive 132 miles away, a 2 hour 6 minute drive. Syracuse is 1144 miles away (an 18 hour 30 minute drive). Then again, I’m sure Dick Vitale and company would point out that Florida had to drive the whole 132 miles, while Syracuse simply had to drive about 12 minutes to the Hancock Airport, then fly to Tampa, and then drive a few miles to the Tampa arena. Definitely no home court advantage for Florida in this one, unlike Syracuse which has Madison Square Garden in its back yard (it’s very big back yard). All sarcasm aside, I don't mind this game being a neutral court game; it was on a 'neutral' court. Just remember to give Syracuse the same respect about its other two 'neutral' court games at Madison Square Garden.

Geography 101

The Syracuse Orange are now 6-0, after putting away Columbia in the second half of Friday night’s game at the Carrier Dome. Wesley Johnson was exciting on offense, Andy Rautins had his usual stellar defensive effort, and Jim Boeheim moved in to sole possession of 7th place on the all-time win list with win # 805.

I would like to take a break, to educate all the youth of America who are being educated by Professor Dick Vitale on the proximity of Madison Square Garden to Syracuse University. He likes to reiterate each and every year that Syracuse ‘never’ leaves NY state before the Big East season, as if that is a tremendous home field for Syracuse. I will of course agree that the following statement is indeed correct:

“Syracuse and Madison Square Garden are indeed both in New York State”

For those unfamiliar with the geography of New York, that is about the only thing in common with New York city and Syracuse. Syracuse University is 249 miles driving distance from Madison Square Garden (per MapQuest). It is a 4 hours 22 minutes away.

Syracuse is not on a subway line from New York City. Many people from Syracuse have never been to New York City. I had never visited New York City until I was 20 years old. Roughly 27% of the Syracuse city area is covered by trees, and the city receives more snowfall than any other major US city with 115 inches of snow a year. The immediate areas surrounding Syracuse are known for apple orchards, wineries, and dairy farms.

Syracuse is closer to the states of Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Connecticut than it is to New York City. It is closer to Canada, than it is to the Big Apple.

Of the original 8 Big East Schools, guess which university is the furthest from Madison Square Garden? Yes, the answer is indeed Syracuse. Here’s the list with their Mapquest driving distance.

St. John’s – 0 miles (The Red Storm play some home games at MSG)
Seton Hall – 19 miles
Villanova – 96 miles
UConn – 142 miles
Providence – 180 miles
Boston College – 216 miles
Georgetown - 229 miles
Syracuse – 249 miles

In the new Big East alignment, Rutgers is added to the above list at only 14 miles. And just for the heck of it, here are three non-Big East schools of note: Temple is 96 miles, University of Maryland is 222 miles and Penn State University is 239 miles away.

Syracuse is closer to Toronto, Ontario at 245 miles. It is virtually the same distance to Montreal, Quebec at 252 miles. And Philadelphia, Pennsylvania at 245 miles. And Hartford, Connecticut at 256 miles. Erie, Pennsylvania, at the far western corner of the state of Pennsylvania is 238 miles away.

Anyhow, I hope you all get the point. Yes, Syracuse is in New York State. But unless you count all the cities just mentioned as 'home' games for Syracuse, then please don't apply the same standard to Madison Square Garden. That goes to you too Mr. Vitale.

#804 for Boeheim behind Balanced Scoring

The Orange moved to 5-0 with a hard earned victory over Cornell. Syracuse grabbed control of the game in the second half and made the final score one sided, but Cornell shot the lights out in the first half, and made the Orange work for this one. This was Jim Boeheim’s 804th career victory, tying him for 7th all time with Eddie Sutton.

The Orange have not yet played a game that has been close in the final two minutes, so there are many questions on how those types of games will go for Syracuse. Jonny Flynn and Eric Devendorf were the ‘go to’ guys in the past couple of years. There may not be ‘the guy’ to go to this year, at least not in the classical sense of the big scorer. I suspect as the season goes on that one of the guards will become the playmaker that you want the ball in the hands of, and he’ll make the right decision. And I think Wesley Johnson and Andy Rautins, depending on the scenario will be the guys who end up taking those last minutes shots more often than not. But we will have to wait and see.

Syracuse has a statistical anomaly after the first five games. Five different players have led the Orange in scoring this season: Arinze Onuaku, Andy Rautins, Scoop Jardine, Wesley Johnson and Brandon Triche. This year’s team is a selfless team, as a few of the players have already stated, and so far the scoring indicates that. It will be interesting how that plays out over the course of the year.

When was the last time the Orangemen had 5 different players lead them in scoring in the first five games? If you go back to the 2003-2004 season, they had four players do it in the first five games: Gerry McNamara, Hakim Warrick, Billy Edelin and Terrence Roberts.

You could go back to 1980-1981 where Tony Bruin, Leo Rautins, Erich Santifer, Danny Schayes and Marty Headd all led the team in scoring in the first five games. But I would not really count this one, as Headd and Rautins tied for the lead in scoring in one game, and Schayes led it two other games.

The last time that five different players led the team in scoring for each of the five games was 34 years ago back in 1976-1977, Jim Boeheim’s first year (and victories #1 through #4). Larry Kelley, Roosevelt Bouie, Dale Shackleford, Marty Byrnes and Ross Kindel all had a hand in leading the team in scoring. That team would end up 26-4. Noteworthy is that Louis Orr was on that team, and was not one of those five players.

Three other times in school history this pattern has emerged. In 1935-1936, Ollie Scott, Norm Leavitt, Jack Curran, Edgar Sonderman and Johnny Simonaitus each had the honor. The squad would finish the year 12-5.

In 1922-1923, the Orangemen struggled to find a consistent leader, and had six different players lead them in scoring in the first six games: George Fisher, George Noakes, Pete MacRae, Bernie Kates, Pep Fasce, and John Gallivan. This team struggled to 9-11. Ironically, they started out 5-0.

And back in 1918-1919, the Orangemen had Jimmy Kernan, Bob Marcus, John Barsha, Nick Paul and Danny Martin all take the honors in the first five games. That squad would finish 13-3. Ironically, the team’s second leading scorer Charley Dolley, would not take scoring honors until the 7th game of the season; Dolley was also the team’s clutch shooter that year winning three games with last minute baskets.

We'll have to wait and see if Syracuse can pull a sixth top scorer for the Columbia game this coming Friday. Perhaps Rick Jackson or Kris Joseph will get the honor.

Have a Happy Thanksgiving!

Orange Win 2k Sports Classic

Wow. I would be lying if I told you I thought the Orange would be 4-0 at this point of this season. I would have been pleased with 3-1. The team lost its top three scorers from last season, including Jonny Flynn who basically controlled every aspect of the offense last year.

Syracuse easily beat Robert Morris and Albany. I had hope and optimism from those two games because the Orange not only beat those teams, but they beat them easily, something that Syracuse really has not done for the past decade. Even in the famous 2002-2003 season, the Orange won a lot of close games, and really never blew too many teams out of the building.

But this year’s Orangemen have taken this a step even further. The not only beat easily the teams they should beat, they took on #12 California and #4 North Carolina, and easily dismantled those teams. That’s the North Carolina Tar Heels, the defending national champion. Yes, the Tar Heels lost four starters from last year, but they still have a ton of talent, a Hall of Fame coach, and they were ranked #4. That was Syracuse 87, North Carolina 71.

I have no idea how good this Syracuse team is, but it is clearly not the #6 team in the Big East. Wesley Johnson is one of those rare situations where he is better than advertised. Johnson had 25 points and 8 rebounds against a big Tar Heel front line. He was 10-17 from the floor and 4-8 from three point range.

Andy Rautins has clearly grabbed the leadership of this team, and his teammates are behind him. Rautins defense in the zone has been simply superb this year. He had seven steals this evening, to go along with his seven rebounds and seven assists. Oh yeah, he did make a few threes going 3-8. Rautins is showing all the poise, guile and maturity of a fifth year senior, and that time on the Canadian National Team is surely helping him. And those passes Rautins is throwing? I hope his teammates are icing down their hands because he is blistering them.

Scoop Jardine is making us almost want to say “Johnny who?”. Jardine is not the scorer Flynn was, but he surely is showing he can run an offense. And he is backing up Brandon Triche. I’ll be really excited to see what happens when these two actually learn how to run this team.

Rick Jackson and Arinze Onuaku are just eating up the inside. And unlike the past two seasons, their teammates are getting the ball inside to them.

Of course the real success to this team is their defense, which has been outstanding. Extremely active, very active. They have long bodies on the court, but it’s the mental attitude that is making the difference. These guys really buy into the Jim Boeheim defense, and are giving a clinic on how to run it.

We can temper our expectations with a few realities. The team is flat awful at free throw shooting. If another team can get them into a close game, it will be tough for the Orange to pull it out. It some aspects it reminds me of the Orangemen in the Coleman-Douglas-Owens era. Those guys would run most opponents off the court; when they lost a game it was a close one where the free throws did matter.

The Orangemen are also making a lot of turnovers, though they did well against California. Part of that is being overly aggressive, and part is being youthful at some positions. Those types of turnovers can hurt you down the road. This is something that can be corrected (unlike the free throws which will be an albatross this year).

It is going to be a long season. One with many ups and downs as the team learns. But right now they are definitely on an up. Hard to believe this is the same squad who played LeMoyne a few weeks ago. Time for the Orange fans to really enjoy this.

I know I am eager to see what this team can do over the long haul. Let’s go Orange!

Let's Play Two

“Let’s play two”, was what the legendary Ernie Banks was attributed to saying. The Orange faithful can all remember back to the memorable 6 Overtime game against UConn on March 12th, 2009 at the Big East Tournament. It surely seemed like Syracuse played two that day. And technically, they did as when the game ended at 1:40 am EDT, they went to bed, woke up and played West Virginia that night (and of course, that game went into overtime too). I doubt we’ll ever see another team play 195 minutes of basketball in the Big East tournament, even if they expand to another round.

The other thing we are likely never to see again is a scheduled doubleheader of basketball. Who would be crazy enough to do that? Well, former Syracuse coach and athletic director Lew Andreas did just that to kick off the 1948-1949 season. Syracuse played the University of Toronto on the afternoon of December 4th, 1948 at the Syracuse Coliseum, and later that evening came back and played the Ithaca College. Syracuse would win both games easily, beating Toronto 81-41, and Ithaca 76-34. Jack Kiley and Ed Stickel would lead the scoring for the day, both having a combined 25 points for each game.

Of course, Syracuse did have some advantages in those games, especially when compared to the Syracuse/UConn 6OT game. First of all, the competition was far less intense, as the final scores indicated. Second of all, there was a couple of hours break between the two games. And third, and most importantly, was how deep Andreas went into his bench for each game.

In terms of playing his reserve players, Andreas was the anti-Boeheim. 19 different Orangemen would play against Toronto in the first game, 17 players would play in the second game. Coach Andreas was notorious for making wholesale substitutions during his coaching career on the hill, and often had a First Team, Second Team, Third Team, that he would send in as a whole group. In some games, he would start his second team, and then bring his first team in.

The 19 players that Andreas played in the Ithaca game were not a school record. On January 14, 1939, Syracuse played Fordham at Archbold Gymnasium. The Orangemen routed the Rams 57-22. Andreas would play 21 different players that day; the local news that day questioned if that was possibly a collegiate record (I don’t know the answer to that even now).

To put 21 players into perspective, Jim Boeheim has only played 20 different players the past two seasons combined, and 25 different players the past three seasons combined.

Anyhow, let’s play two!