Syracuse loses another halftime lead, falls 79-75 at Georgetown
Syracuse loses another halftime lead, drops road game at Georgetown
The Syracuse men’s basketball team has struggled this season to play complete games. This afternoon’s 79-75 loss to Georgetown was the latest edition of a tale of two halves.
The Orange got off to a hot start. Buddy Boeheim had missed his last nine three-point attempts over the last two games but he drained his first two today.
Joe Girard III started hot too and scored 13 points in the first half. SU even got great production from the center position – Jesse Edwards and Frank Anslem combined for 13 points in the first 20 minutes. Then, as it has all season long, the Orange were not able to make the big shot or get the big stop.
Georgetown came out in the second half and began taking control. Syracuse retook a 63-60 lead with 7:51 in the second half after an offensive rebound and kick-out three to Boeheim. The Orange had the lead with just over a minute left in the game before Kaiden Rice hit a deep three-pointer to give the Hoyas a 75-73 lead. From there, Georgetown never looked back.
“We didn’t find [Kaiden] Rice at the end, you’re in a close game, you’re going to get that opportunity, you’ve got to make someone else shoot it there,” Head Coach Jim Boeheim said.
“When we get stops it leads to fast-break points, which is pretty good for us,” said Girard, who scored two points in the second half. “We have a lot of shooters and fast-break threes are a lot easier than threes in the half-court.”
Jim’s biggest concern about his team was the defense and its inability to make a stop at the time it needed to.
“We are struggling a little bit on the defensive end, we’ve got to be more efficient on offense,” Jim said. “First half we were, second half we weren’t.”
Buddy said on the defensive side of the ball they need to do a better job of rotating and getting to shooters.
“Just simple rotations on defense, communicating more, talking more,” Buddy said.
Coming off of Tuesday night’s loss to No. 6 Villanova, today was an opportunity for the Orange to get a win to help bolster their resume and get a winning streak started.
Instead, Syracuse fell back to the .500 mark at 5-5 on the season. The Orange have a week until they play Lehigh at the Dome next Saturday.
is a graduate student in the broadcast and digital journalism program and a reporter for The NewsHouse.
is a photographer for The NewsHouse.
