The Syracuse Orange basketball team was outdone in the Dean Smith Center on Monday night, falling to the No. 14 North Carolina Tar Heels by a final score of 87-77. The Orange fell to 0-7 all-time at the Smith Center.
North Carolina (18-4, 6-3) led by as many as 32 but a late push by Syracuse (13-10, 4-6) trimmed the Tar Heel lead to six. There would be no miraculous comeback as North Carolina closed the game out from the free throw line. The Tar Heels out-rebounded the Orange 41-31 and had its bench outscore Syracuse’s 29-16.
North Carolina was led by Caleb Wilson’s 22 point, 9 rebound night. Henri Veesaar had a double-double with 17 points and 11 rebounds. Syracuse was led by Donnie Freeman, who finished with 23 points and 8 rebounds. Naithan George, JJ Starling and Kiyan Anthony all finished scoring in double-figures with 15, 13 and 10 points, respectively.
North Carolina led 46-32 at the half. Freeman carried Syracuse with 18 first half points, including a banked-in three at the halftime buzzer.
To the takeaways.
Ball movement stops
It was Groundhog Day on Big Monday.
The Syracuse offense reverted to isolation basketball at North Carolina. What happened to all that ball movement, energy and quick decision making from Saturday? It’s not like Syracuse went one-on-one without good reason. It had a strategy.
Syracuse was looking to get Seth Trimble to switch on Freeman and exploit the mismatch. The Orange was successful as Freeman was able to get the switch and score with the 6-foot-3 guard on him. He went for 18 first half points.
It was hardly a masterclass in modern basketball, though, as many of Freeman’s points came from mid-range in isolation. Syracuse goes to its horns set on offense, but the ball dies after the first or second action. Freeman shot 6-9 in the first half (66.7%). The rest of the team shot 5-16 in the first half (31.3%).
“I just thought our inability to get anything going constantly on offense was a big, big issue,” Adrian Autry said post-game. “They started switching everything. We didn’t make the ball move as we would like.”
At times when Freeman wasn’t able to carry the offense, the Orange stagnated and turned the ball over. Syracuse became predictable and easy to guard. Nine first half turnovers led to nine Carolina points, also fueling an 8-0 fastbreak point edge.
“A lot of our guys are used to playing with the ball with their hands and when that happens they stand up and now we don’t have any movement. That’s the thing we have to work on,” Autry said. “We have to do a better job of moving without the ball. You can’t do that in today’s game.”
Syracuse went away from the Freeman isolation offense in the second half, spaced the floor and let the guards attack. Shooting percentages were similar overall (44% in the first, 45% in the second). The Orange shot just 3-12 from three in the second half (25%).
“We have to be able to learn from this and move forward and get better,” Autry said.
The groundhog saw its shadow on Monday and predicted six more weeks of winter.
Defense picked apart
The initial identity and strength of this Syracuse basketball team has turned into a weakness. The intensity on the defensive end has waned considerably.
The mid-second half dip was back in a big way. Syracuse fell behind 20 at the 15:53 mark, went down by as many as 32 at the 9:32 mark and didn’t work the deficit back to 20 until 4:33 remaining. This team’s dips last longer than a 20’s-something investment banker’s.
Whether it was Freeman, Sadiq White or the 2-3 zone, the Orange just had no answers for the 6-foot-10 Wilson. Not many teams do. The freshman was able to draw fouls and get to the line where he shot 10-13. The Orange went to zone in the second half, which had mixed results at best. Wilson and Veesaar combined for 39 points and 20 rebounds on 13-25 shooting from the floor. As a team, North Carolina shot 48% from the floor and 44% from three including 16 assists on 27 made baskets.
Give Syracuse some acknowledgement for not laying down and trimming the deficit to just six with under a minute left. Some of that also had to do with North Carolina taking its foot off the gas.
Had the deficit been 25 points and not 32 things would’ve been far more interesting. But 32 is almost impossible to mount. You’d have to be Louis Sachar writing child fiction to dig out of a hole that deep.
Syracuse a mere footnote on Big Monday
Right at the open of the ESPN broadcast, the conversation had little to do with the game at hand and focused more about the upcoming Duke-North Carolina game on Saturday.
Now, the Duke-Carolina rivalry is second to none and even Syracuse at its peak isn’t standing in the way of that. But to say this game was the undercard to North Carolina’s week would be underselling it. Syracuse was an afterthought.
Outside of a late run, the Orange didn’t do much to change the conversation throughout the game. The program continues to struggle in nationally televised games.
Syracuse has lost its last four games on ESPN’s flagship channel. Three of those have been double-digit defeats. In its last 18 games against ranked opponents on ESPN, Syracuse basketball has a record of 2-16.
