Dordevic Shines as Syracuse Earns First Ranked Win of the Season

Syracuse (4-4, 1-1 ACC) took down its first ranked opponent of the season yesterday. The Orange beat No. 10 Duke (8-4, 0-1 ACC) 14-10 in a potential season-changing win. Before yesterday’s victory, the Orange had struggled against ranked teams losing to #1 Maryland, No. 2 Virginia, No. 13 Army, and No. 19 Johns Hopkins. But today was different thanks in large part to another career day from redshirt junior Tucker Dordevic.

The attack finished with five goals, but the one to remember happened early on in the fourth quarter, with the Blue Devils on the heels of the Orange. Duke went on a 4-1 run to cut the SU lead to one; the captain received a high pass from Landon Clary and, in one motion, went through the legs to bounce it home.

“I kind of just shot it underhand between my legs and was hoping it would go in so I wouldn’t get in trouble,” Dordevic said postgame.

Dordevic’s final goal of the contest electrified the Dome, turning the tides and shifting the momentum back to the Orange to propel them to a 3-0 run to close out the game.

Gait joked about what he would’ve done if Dordevic didn’t connect on the highlight-reel goal. “He had 21 other shots, so he had plenty of other ones. What’s a one-hander you know. That’s a higher percentage shot for him.”

That coming from the inventor of “Air Gait,” a leaping, slam dunk-type shot from behind the net which the SU head coach is known for from his days playing with the Orange. Gait has been in plenty of situations where he let his talent take over, so he knows the feeling.

“It was a reactionary shot and that’s what you need to do in that scenario,” coach Gait said. “If it was a perfect pass, I’m sure he would have caught it and just buried it but the fact that the pass was a little off, he reacted, and it allowed him to make that play.”

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The Oregonian has scored five or more goals in five of SU’s eight games this season, doing it against Holy Cross, Maryland, Hobart, Stony Brook and now Duke. Dordevic added two assists on the game’s final two goals to bring his point total to seven.

While Dordevic collected a handful of goals, Syracuse spread the wealth on offense early on, opening the game on a 6-1 run with six different players finding the back of the net. SU ended with four other players in double-digit goals (Mikey Berkman, Owen Seebold, Brendan Curry, and Matteo Corsi).

On the defensive end, Syracuse kept Duke in check for most of the afternoon. Ten goals tie a season-low for the Blue Devils and is the third consecutive game SU has held a team to ten or fewer goals. The Orange did it against Stony Brook last weekend and Johns Hopkins the weekend before.

The schedule doesn’t get much easier for Syracuse moving forward. SU travels to South Bend next Saturday to take on No. 12 Notre Dame. WAER has coverage starting at 1:30 pm with GZA Countdown to Faceoff followed by game time at 2 pm.