Awful.

[HRE Otto IV]

Have you paid any attention to SU football the last 10 years or did you check in only in 2018 and 2022?

You do realize we're 26-56 in conference games since moving to the ACC right? So the answer to your question is either most or all of 'em.

Outside of the 2020 debacle, our ACC records vs Southern schools under Babers:

2-0 VA Tech
1-0 Duke
UNC
UVA
0-0 GA Tech
2-4 NC State
Louisville
Wake
1-5 Clemson
FSU
0-1 Miami

Take away Clemson and FSU and we are 11-13. So how is that being beaten up by Southern schools?

Really Pitt has been a bigger issue for us than the Southern schools.

BC 4-2
Pitt 1-5

Now that we don't have Clemson every year, we should be better off. We do still have FSU though. Against everyone else we are 16-20 under Babers. That is not far off from where we should be.

If you excuse his first two years as he had to build up from Shafer, we are 13-11 against ACC teams not named Clemson and FSU in non Covid years.

Overall the Babers era has been disappointing, but outside of 2020 we haven't been too far off from right where we should be (35-39 overall and 16-20 ACC against non Clemson/FSU).

 

[orangecuse]

Good for them. Lots of luck too. Butler in 2011, UK in 2014 and San Diego State last night are 3 of the worst teams to make the final game ever. And I am not taking away anything from them.

They have blown up every hypothesis about being consistently good. It does not matter to them specifically.

Perhaps. If that makes their achievements for you and those with this similar train of thought more digestible, so be it. There's also that saying; 'luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.'

 

[Cusefan0307]

Perhaps, if that makes their achievements for you and those with this similar train of thought more digestible. There's also that saying; 'luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.'

9 years between tourney wins while winning titles without a one or two seed is such an outlier on the statistical spectrum as is 3 titles in 14 years never being higher than a 4 seed.

Imagine being a fan of Gonzaga or Purdue who put up great seeds every year without winning anything. There’s so many schools that have outperformed UConn on a season by season basis the past 15 seasons who haven’t even made the title game. At this point all you can do is laugh. Good? sure. But lots of good luck for them and bad luck for others.

 

[Hopkins16]

We've sent out more rrcruit offers than ever before and got more rejections than ever before. Coincidence? Staff suddenly lost its edge? JB was not growing old faster than Uncle Roy and
Mike but recruits were not turning them down. Coincidence?
Recruiting is sakes and a good product image sells its. Brand is the be all and end all. Beast of the East was a priceless brand. Cuse in the South is an unbranded product. Kids are not buying it.

So what do we do? Cry about not being in the Big East and how we were a beast in the East? Living in the past doesn't help to move forward - granted, it probably wasn't a great move for basketball but this is where we are now so we have no choice but to make the best of it and/or figure out how and when we can get back to the Big East at a minimal cost as the early exit fee to leave the ACC might be tremendous and not an option.

 

[CuseCPT]

The switch to the ACC from the Big East is not the reason for the basketball inconsistency. The reason is playing an archaic defense that is not viewed as preparing recruits for the NBA. If you think about recruiting over the past few years, there were multiple times we were in the top 3 and top 5 for 5 star recruits. Having a 70+ year old coach and the zone hurt us in landing many of them. Even with those limitations, we still are an attractive basketball destination. Playing man and combined with a younger coach, will help us and we have the potential to get back to what we were consistently. The key in my opinion is not just recruiting, but if Red and the staff can develop talent and adapt to his roster.

It’s not THE reason, but it made it worse.

 

[capeorange]

CousCuse wishes he had my UMass diploma

Nice try Cous

 

[djorange1989]

You switched from football to basketball?
I agree 100% with you on on recruiting, 2-3 and it was not the move to the ACC but our slide into mediocrity coinciding with our time in the ACC.

Football will struggle wherever we are but we at least can be a consistent bowl team. The money we get being in the ACC funds an entire athletic department so i think it just has to be. No excuse for football to not make bowls consistently at least

 

[Scooch]

Why is Marquette, Xavier, and Creighton currently better than Nova, St. Johns, and Georgetown? There's no geographic commonality at all.

This is a good point. Is the suggestion that ONLY northeast teams suffer when they play teams from outside their region in conference? Because those midwest teams have done pretty damn well doing just that.

 

[HRE Otto IV]

I actually liked the Bloated Big East of the post-2004 era. It was an absolute gauntlet. Marquette and Louisville were really good programs to add. Cincy was back on its way up with Cronin. At least 8 of the programs were major national powers with tons of history and consistent success—Cuse, Gtown, UConn, Nova, Pitt, Louisville, Marquette and Cincinnati. Almost all of them had won national titles. You could even throw Notre Dame in there as a national brand. West Virginia was back on the upswing with Huggy returning home. And St John’s, Providence and Seton Hall had all been to Final Fours in the 64-team era.

Competitively the conference was great. But it was no longer a Northeast conference and you lost the round robin games. Plus being in a 16 team league is too large.

That Big East really needed a 22 game season. Then you could have had the OG teams playing each other twice a year and the Newbies once a year. It is crazy that the first 2 years had only 16 games!

Something like...

SU, UConn, Providence, St Johns, Seton Hall, Nova, Georgetown, Pitt

Notre Dame, Marquette, DePaul, Louisville, Cincy, WV, Rutgers, USF

 

[orangecuse]

9 years between tourney wins while winning titles without a one or two seed is such an outlier on the statistical spectrum as is 3 titles in 14 years never being higher than a 4 seed.

Imagine being a fan of Gonzaga or Purdue who put up great seeds every year without winning anything. There’s so many schools that have outperformed UConn on a season by season basis the past 15 seasons who haven’t even made the title game. At this point all you can do is laugh. Good? sure. But lots of good luck for them and bad luck for others.

Such is life. Perhaps, in the metaverse or beyond, everything will be fair.

 

[NKR1978]

This is a good point. Is the suggestion that ONLY northeast teams suffer when they play teams from outside their region in conference? Because those midwest teams have done pretty damn well doing just that.

It's amazing...we were a hot program with great recruiting right up until we got on probation. That also coincided with JB's age catching up to him and losing Hop. We'd be looking a lot better if we got some of the guys Hop brought to UW with JB coaching them and our other players. That's all the ACC's fault, obviously.

 

[OrangeXtreme]

 

[Eric15]

Honestly I’m just kind of happy the college basketball season is over. The tourney felt like a big party that we weren’t invited to and UConn’s title was sports fandom death by a thousand paper cuts because it felt inevitable since about the second half of the St Mary’s game.

Looking forward to the NBA playoffs which is incredibly wide open this year.

 

[orange79]

I'm just glad "some people" don't run the Athletic Department at SU.

 

[JimBoston]

Personally I think our NYC presence is the least of our geographic issues, if there are some. We've played games there every season we've been in the ACC, save for one. And we've often visited twice in the same season for different events/games. We're still considered a "local" team by the NY media as well.

UConn played 24 games this year within 150 miles of MSG. Syracuse played 2. I think that impacts visibility in the tri state area.

On recruiting, besides upstate NY, what have been Syracuse's basketball recruiting footprint? NYC/NJ/New England/MD/Philly/DC. Syracuse played 3 games in the recruiting footprint. UConn played 26.

 

[Chip]

Have you paid any attention to SU football the last 10 years or did you check in only in 2018 and 2022?

You do realize we're 26-56 in conference games since moving to the ACC right? So the answer to your question is either most or all of 'em.

What was our record in Big East games the 10 years before that?

We're a mediocre program, and outside the Covid year, showed we're generally a middle of the pack ACC team.

You talk like we're Vandy.

 

[Chip]

Last year proved to me we are way over our head in the ACC for football. It was our best team in eons and we STILL lost 6 in a row after we were punched in the face and got dinged up to the point where we barely could field a line.

Our worst years in the Big East were because of incompetence at HC. Last year I felt we were very competent in our coaching but we are just overmatched.

Not sure why this isn't glaringly obvious to everyone. Our football team was salvaged only to be beat up in a southern centric football league that is deeper and better than us. Due to this paycheck, maybe because we had Jim Boeheim (maybe not), our basketball team has taken a real downturn into mediocrity. Yes we got to a sweet 16 and final four. BUT let's look ourselves in the mirror and ask: "are we as good as we were in the big east?"

Answer is no. Time will tell if it was chicken (boeheim) or the egg (the conference is a bad fit and has made us a less impactful location for recruits). Who knows we'll see

We lost 5 in a row. And yes, it really sucked. But a 6 point loss on the road at the #5 team in the country. A loss to ND, and road losses to Wake/Pitt, complete meltdown against FSU.

It wasn't the end of the world. 7 win team who went 4-4 in the ACC. Way over our head.

 

[OrangeinBoston]

We lost 5 in a row. And yes, it really sucked. But a 6 point loss on the road at the #5 team in the country. A loss to ND, and road losses to Wake/Pitt, complete meltdown against FSU.

It wasn't the end of the world. 7 win team who went 4-4 in the ACC. Way over our head.

It was a good step upward. I expect that to continue this season.

 

[Dinkyspond]

Return to the Big East? Why not improve the program to be competitive in the ACC? Return to the Big East is looking for an excuse. The first step was remove the coach. Check. Now it remains to be seen if this coach was the right coach. We'll know in 3 years.

 

[Scooch]

UConn played 24 games this year within 150 miles of MSG. Syracuse played 2. I think that impacts visibility in the tri state area.

On recruiting, besides upstate NY, what have been Syracuse's basketball recruiting footprint? NYC/NJ/New England/MD/Philly/DC. Syracuse played 3 games in the recruiting footprint. UConn played 26.

Well, yeah, Storrs and Hartford have always been closer to Manhattan than Syracuse. That’s not a new dynamic.

Even in years in the BE when we played a couple more games in the NYC metro UConn still played 20+ more.

 

[OrlandoCuse]

UConn played 24 games this year within 150 miles of MSG. Syracuse played 2. I think that impacts visibility in the tri state area.

On recruiting, besides upstate NY, what have been Syracuse's basketball recruiting footprint? NYC/NJ/New England/MD/Philly/DC. Syracuse played 3 games in the recruiting footprint. UConn played 26.

Helps when your campus is within 150 miles of MSG and the other is not

 

[Cusesky8214]

 

[Sherman20]

UConn played 24 games this year within 150 miles of MSG. Syracuse played 2. I think that impacts visibility in the tri state area.

On recruiting, besides upstate NY, what have been Syracuse's basketball recruiting footprint? NYC/NJ/New England/MD/Philly/DC. Syracuse played 3 games in the recruiting footprint. UConn played 26.

You’re counting their home games. Stop with this cherry-picking of facts. Outside of their home games, they play St John’s, Seton Hall (lol), Gtown, Providence and Nova on the road.

 

[gmoney44]

I feel like the whole college basketball season was awful. This season lacked great teams and there were few stars. College basketball is not at its peak that’s for sure.

College basketball has sucked for awhile and we didn’t even sniff the bubble for the last two seasons. We have fallen off the face of the earth during the worst period in college basketball in my lifetime and I’m no spring chicken.

 

[CousCuse]

In 10 years Syracuse Basketball will be back in the Big East and Syracuse Football will be in a league with Yukon, UMass, Army and whoever else doesn't want to make the jump to the inevitable super conferences

The ACC has very little presence in the northeast. Syracuse is the only real viable program the league has. I don't count Pitt as a northeast team and BC doesn't have any fan base.