The Syracuse Orange’s long, strange, winding journey has finally come to an end after six games, five states, 5,279 miles
traveled, 37 days and a 4-2 record.They’re finally home for the first time since their February 13 win over Maryland, and today they’re back for another big non-conference battle against the No. 13 Georgetown Hoyas at 1 PM on ACC Network Extra.
This is the 24th all-time meeting between the programs dating back to 1995. The teams played every year after that up until 2013, ‘Cuse’s
last year in the Big East and the most recent time they’ve met in the regular season.
The Orange have won 17 of the 23 meetings, although the Hoyas have won two of the last three, including the last meeting in the first round of the 2021 NCAA Tournament. They also won the last game in the series inside the Dome back in 2012, a 10-8 win for the visitors.
Season so far
Georgetown is a tough team to figure out at the midway point of the season, and for good reason.
They got off to a very slow start this year, in large part because the winter weather wiped out their first two scheduled games of the year against Loyola and Johns Hopkins. Their first game ended up being February 14 on the road at Penn, which they won, 12-9.
From there, they went on a three-game losing streak against Notre Dame, Ohio State and Richmond to drop themselves to a surprising 1-3 for a team that was ranked in the Top 5 in the preseason. That being said, those three teams are currently ranked No. 1, No. 7 and No. 2, respectively, so there’s not much shame there.
They’ve bounced back in the last couple weeks with relatively comfortable wins over UAlbany and a rescheduled game against Loyola to improve themselves to 3-3 on the year heading into today.
Overview
The Hoyas are a team that have a lot of great pieces, but have yet to fully put it all together. They’ve only played six games, three fewer than the Orange to this point, so they’re obviously behind in game reps for their talented roster.
They currently rank 30th in the country in scoring offense at 11.67 goals per game, and are tied for 31st in scoring defense at 10.5 goals against per game.
Their best team attribute is their shooting accuracy, coming in at seventh nationally with a very strong .338 percentage.
Connor brothers lead the way
The Georgetown offense was in a tough spot coming out of 2025, losing their top two scorers (by far), who accounted for roughly 40 percent of their scoring.
Enter the Connor brothers as transfers from Colgate to take their spots. Amazingly, they’ve done that and more as they’ve combined to score just under 47 percent of the Hoyas’ points thus far. So, while the Connor’s provide a lot of star power on the attack line, the question of who consistently steps up from their supporting cast appears to still be up in the air.
Graduate student Rory Connor is the team’s leading scorer with 27 goals and 33 points. His 4.5 goals per game leads the country and his ridiculous .509 shooting percentage (27-of-53) is fourth best, although he’s the only player in the country to be shooting over 50 percent with over 40 shots taken for the season. He’s by far the best finisher on the team and has three times as many goals as second place, so finding and sticking to him will be a huge assignment for the Syracuse defense.
Younger brother and junior Liam Connor tips the opposite end of the point-scoring scale than his big brother, leading the team with 20 assists and second behind his brother with 25 points. Liam is the pure passer to Rory’s pure finisher, and his 3.33 assists per game is good for second best in the country.
At 6’4”, Liam is the bigger of the brothers, which would seemingly suggest Billy Dwan territory. However, Liam is more of the X-quarterback-style ball carrier and passer, which would suggest Riley Figueiras. It’ll be interesting to see how they divvy up marking the Connor’s.
Elsewhere, Jack Schubert is the second-leading goal scorer with nine, and the only other player who’s scored in double-figures with 13 points on the season.
Last season, Jack Ransom, Kevin Miller and Joe Cesare were third through fifth on the team in scoring, meaning they’re the three highest returning scorers from 2025. They combined to score 90 points last year but are all off to slower paces so far.
Ransom, who had a huge freshman season with 31 goals and 36 points, has only scored six goals and nine points so far as a sophomore. Miller put up 18 goals and 28 points last year, but only has four goals and six points. Cesare scored 19 goals and 26 points but only has a single goal and five assists in 2026.
The production is clearly there for all of them, but has yet to show itself so far this season.
Face-off struggles
The Hoyas’ primary FOGO is freshman Hayden Cody, whose struggled early in his career with a .461 win percentage (41-of-89).
Last season, Ross Prince had a huge freshman season as the main taker, facing-off to 63 percent for the year. This season, he’s missed half their games and has dealt with inconsistency as a result. He’s only at .482 right now (27-of-56), and just returned early this past week for their game against Loyola, where he went 6-of-14 (.429) in his return.
As a team, they’re at a .455 win percentage through six games.
Solid at the back
While the face-offs have been an issue, there’s no such concerns between the pipes where junior Anderson Moore returns to run the show at the back. Moore is one of the best goalies in the country having earned All-American nods in each of his first two years on campus.
One of the most athletic and rangy goalies in the country, he is not afraid to insert himself into a clear situation and carry the ball across midfield himself.
This season, he’s made 72 saves with a 10.62 goals-against average and a .533 save percentage.
