While we’ve spent a lot of time looking at metrics and projections while talking about the Syracuse men’s basketball team, we are about to get some answers.
The Orange went 9-4 in the non-conference with
one good win, one bad loss and a lot of unconvincing wins. Will this team be able to win enough ACC games to get into NCAA Tournament consideration? Will there be a new coaching staff in place this spring?
A lot of answers will come quickly as Syracuse enters ACC play tomorrow afternoon against Clemson. The Orange’s next six games are the easiest stretch for the rest of the season. After Clemson, Syracuse will play at Georgia Tech, at Pittsburgh, vs Florida State, at Boston College and then finish the stretch hosting Virginia Tech.
Right now three of the games are Q2 (Clemson, Pitt and Virginia Tech) while the others are Q3. The Tigers and Panthers are the two games, Syracuse is projected to loss (via Bart Torvik’s projections), but both games are currently toss-up. Anything less than 5-1 in this next few weeks will put Adrian Autry’s squad in a position where they will need to knock off some top ACC teams on the road.
If Syracuse can get to 14-5 and avoid dropping one of the Q3 games, they will still have a good amount of work to get back on the right side of the bubble, but they have a chance. The Q2 games will help the metrics, but more importantly it helps the perception of bracketologists. After beating Tennessee, Syracuse jumped right into at-large consideration in a lot of spots. The close loss to Houston is still helpful because that game had a lot of eyes on it and the Orange went toe-to-toe with a tough opponent. Even in today’s analytics world, that means something.
Coming out of this stretch at 13-6 puts the team in a much tougher spot. It’s not impossible, but you’re asking the Orange to avoid another slip AND find a way to get multiple road wins against this group: Duke, UNC, NC State, Virginia, Wake Forest and Louisville. Grabbing one win there is realistic, hoping to get two or more is asking a lot.
While this isn’t a “must win” stretch in theory, the reality is that Syracuse needs to stack wins or else it’s a big hill to climb over the final six weeks. Will we see more of the Orange team that took the court against Houston and Tennesse, or more of the Syracuse squad that struggled with Northeastern and Merrimack?
