The plan was to get Jim Boeheim win 1,000 Tuesday night against Colgate, but when the Raiders gashed Syracuse Men’s basketball with 19 three-pointers, the Orange needed a raincheck on that celebration. However, only four days later, the head man officially joined Duke’s Mike Krzyzewski as the only other coach in NCAA history to reach at least 1,000 coaching wins, with a 76-48 win over Northeastern.
The loss to Colgate left plenty of questions unanswered. The most important of them being: how would Syracuse respond? Jesse Edwards was one player who bounced back in a significant way. The Huskies were struggling to contain the Flying Dutchman all night long.
Syracuse 56, Northeastern 35 | 11:11 2H
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Jesse Edwards' domination in the paint continues. After a nice feed from Symir Torrence, the senior hits the stepback. The center now with 19 points on 8-10 shooting.
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The senior followed up his adequate ten point outing against the Raiders with a season-high 19 points Saturday night, which was punctuated by a rim-rocking dunk to close out the first half.
With SU’s lead up to 21, Edwards was subbed out of the game for the final time and his fellow senior, Joe Girard III, followed about two minutes later. Both of them registered under 30 minutes of playing time against Northeastern. The Glens Fall native led the way with 21 points on 5-for-9 shooting from beyond the arc.
The senior guard got off to a hot start when he sunk his first three-point attempt just over 1:20 into the first half. His contributions from deep have been crucial for the Orange, especially tonight.
Syracuse 54, Northeastern 33 | 12:27 2H
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Syracuse with its largest lead of the night. Joe Girard III gets the Dome crows on its feet after drilling a deep ball on one possession and drawing the and-one on the next.
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Girard’s partner in the backcourt, freshman Judah Mintz, excelled once again in front of the home crowd. In all three games at the collegiate level, he’s scored at least 16 points in each of them. He’s averaging 17.0 points per game in the young season.
"Judah's been really good,” head coach Boehiem said. “Smart, taking what's there. He's just scratching the surface. He can get a lot better."
This young Syracuse team still has some kinks that need to be ironed out, but the biggest issue continues to be SU’s three-point defense. Saturday night, Northeastern buried 19 threes and went on runs where they looked unstoppable from behind the arc. After the Orange took a 9-0 lead in the first half, the Huskies hit three straight from beyond the arc to keep it close.
The Orange were in their trademarked 2-3 zone on each of these possessions. However, the zone often collapsed and left the Huskies shooters with wide open looks. Despite all the problems, don’t expect head coach Boeheim to make any changes.
"We just haven't been good in man," he said.
The Orange have plenty of defensive reps to look forward to when they go to Brooklyn on Monday for the Empire Classic. SU’s road to the tournament title starts with a matchup against Richmond at 7 PM. The other teams participating are Temple and St. John’s.