A young Syracuse fan with orange hair wanted his dad to take his hands off of him. The child, in an orange Syracuse shirt, was upset. But his father, wearing a sky blue, Old Dominion No. 1 jersey, was fired up. ODU had pulled off a massive upset, and the father wanted to run to the visiting tunnel at the other end of the Carrier Dome to see the Monarchs leave the floor.

Just feet away, the same dichotomy took place on the court. Syracuse’s players sulked, their heads hung and shoulders drooped, off the floor toward the locker room. After the buzzer, Old Dominion’s squad ran to meet their teammates near the bench, smiling and clapping their hands, before exchanging high-fives.

No. 25 Syracuse (7-3) struggled to pull away from Old Dominion (8-3) for much of Saturday’s first half. But the Orange pulled away for a 10-point lead at the break. Against SU’s season narrative, though, the Orange collapsed in the second half, giving up 45 second half points in a 68-62 loss. The Orange lost the second half by 16 points, their largest second-half deficit of the season.

“We assumed they were gonna lay down, or I don’t know what we were thinking,” SU guard Frank Howard said. “But we just weren’t engaged and we just didn’t have that same intensity. You could feel it, you could see it. Our pace was slower. It’s just not who we are. That’s how we’ll lose.”

For much of the Orange’s first nine games prior to Saturday, they looked like a different team in first halves compared to second halves. Entering Saturday, Syracuse’s margin in the first 20 minutes was plus-14, compared to a plus-73 differential in second halves. That threatened to be the case again Saturday, as with four minutes to go in the opening half, Syracuse led by a point.

Oshae Brissett had picked up three first-half fouls. The Orange struggled to contain Old Dominion’s 7-foot-1, 285-pound center Elbert Robinson III inside. Syracuse’s offense was settling for perimeter jumpers, including inefficient long 2s, and ODU gobbled up rebounds to prevent second chances.

Then, Tyus Battle helped awaken the Syracuse offense. After a Howard free throw, Battle scored eight-straight SU points followed by an Elijah Hughes 3. From a nail-biter, the Orange went into halftime comfortably up double-digits.

But Syracuse again looked like a different team in the second half Saturday — just in reverse.

“We got too comfortable,” Brissett said. “We didn’t really try to separate the game like we usually do.”

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More coverage:

• The Final Word: Syracuse upset against unranked Old Dominion
• Gallery: Syracuse falls to Old Dominion in Carrier Dome
• Syracuse bigs overpowered in loss against Old Dominion

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Ahmad Caver and B.J. Stith, the Monarchs’ two best players, had been quiet in the first half, but both made plays early in the second half to tighten the score. Stith scored 18 second-half points after not scoring in the first 20 minutes. SU’s zone allowed driving lanes it hadn’t in the first half and gave up open perimeter looks to ODU.

“They got four or five corner 3s,” Howard said. “On almost every 3 they hit today was something we talked about during the week.”

Even when things went right for Syracuse, like 6-foot-8 Brissett blocking 7-foot Dajour Dickens’ dunk attempt, they didn’t stay that way. Stith hit a jumper on that same possession to make the block a moot point. Later, SU forced a contested corner 3 but it bounced up off the rim and fell through.

ODU took a 51-50 lead with about five minutes to go when Howard and Battle both spread to guard players on the wings, but Caver stood at the top of the key, unmarked. He drained the 3. Then, a few minutes later, after Hughes missed an on-the-move 3, Caver set up Xavier Green for a catch-and-shoot triple from the right wing to go up four.

“They made a couple big shots,” SU head coach Jim Boeheim said.

Old Dominion kept answering, and for the first time all season in a second half, Syracuse ran out of responses. Battle’s late pull-up jumpers that fell against Georgetown didn’t against the Monarchs, until one brought Syracuse within three but too late. Twice, the Orange tried to find 7-foot-2 Paschal Chukwu on lobs and threw the pass too high. And ODU made its free throws down the stretch, something SU couldn’t do, going 22-of-34 from the foul line. 

“We just didn’t play offensively in the second half,” Boeheim said. “…We’re just not making anything. That’s the bottom line.”

In only three of Syracuse’s first nine games did the Orange manage a better point-differential in the first half than the second. Those three times, that first-half margin was large enough that Syracuse had no trouble winning.

This time, Syracuse had a chance to win its sixth-straight game and a chance to head into Tuesday’s matchup with undefeated Buffalo as a ranked, Interstate-90 duel. It could’ve put the early two losses at Madison Square Garden further in the rearview mirror. But the Orange didn’t do that.

Instead, on Saturday against Old Dominion, SU’s worst second-half differential of the season meant a positive first-half margin didn’t matter. It hadn’t been enough.

“We just weren’t engaged in the second half,” Howard said. “We laid down. Lessons learned. We got beat.”

Published on December 15, 2018 at 2:17 pm

Contact Billy: wmheyen@syr.edu | @Wheyen3