The Syracuse Orange are entering this week still firmly in the mix to make the NCAA Tournament, and the program’s most recent and easily best victory of the year was certainly an important one to get more
hoops in March.
In ESPN’s latest bracketology update released on Tuesday, Syracuse returned back into the projected postseason field. The team jumped up several spots, moving from “Next Four Out” to “Next Four Byes” after defeating Virginia 79-60 on the road Sunday.
It was the Orange’s first Quadrant 1 win of 2025-26 and a major bounce back result for the program after losing by 20 at home to Virginia Tech the game prior.
That said, a decent field of ACC teams remain in the hunt with plenty of basketball still left to play.
Including the Orange, eight programs from the conference are now above the cutoff line, tied for third-most among all conferences. The full list: Louisville (No. 2), Duke (No. 6), North Carolina (No. 7), NC State (No. 7), Notre Dame (No. 8), Stanford (No. 8), Syracuse (Last Four Byes) and Clemson (Last Four In). Virginia (First Four Out), Miami (First Four Out) and Virginia Tech (Next Four Out) sit just outside the bubble.
Syracuse, who is now No. 42 overall in NET (ninth in ACC), has 12 ACC games left before the conference tournament in March. Out of those dozen opponents, seven of them are against teams mentioned in the list above.
The Orange are back home for their next two games, with California (Thursday) and Stanford (Sunday) making the trip to Upstate New York as the team looks to continue trending in the right direction with around two months left until Selection Sunday.
