sutomcat
No recent Cali or Iggy awards; Mr Irrelevant
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Welcome to National Croissant Day!
Today we celebrate a crescent-shaped pastry with a flaky crust, the croissant! Usually made with sugar, salt, flour, milk, eggs, and butter, croissants originated in Vienna, Austria. There are different variations of them, and they can be found all around the world.
Their precursor was the kipferl, a crescent-shaped roll. Kipferls can be plain or have nuts or other fillings, and are made with lots of butter and lard. They are not as flaky as croissants, having a softer and denser dough. They date back to the thirteenth century, when they were eaten as sweets. By the mid-sixteenth century, they became a breakfast food. During the seventeenth century, puff pastry, the dough that would later be used in croissants, began being used in pastry recipes.
The history of croissants is steeped in legend. One legend says that croissants were first made in Buda, the ancient capital of Hungary that is now the western part of Budapest, to celebrate the victory of the Franks over the Umayyads at the Battle of Tours—which happened back in the eighth century. The shape was said to represent the crescent moon of Islam.
SU News
Beacon's Elijah Hughes refines game, leads ACC in scoring with lofty goals in mind (poughkeepsiejournal.com; Martelli)
Over the summer, Elijah Hughes allotted himself plenty of time for extra work.
The guard on the Syracuse University men’s basketball team spent hours shooting during his free time, and attempted to refine his game with the objective of becoming a more polished and consistent player.
He’s proven practice makes perfect.
The 6-foot-6 Beacon product currently leads the Atlantic Coast Conference in points per game — excelling against some of the top competition in the country — thanks to the refinements that have come from those solo workout sessions.
Hughes downplayed the feat, but overall is pleased with how well he’s performed.
“It’s cool, I guess, to lead the ACC in scoring,” he said. “I feel like I’ve been playing decent. It’s been a testament to my work — kind of just me locking in this past offseason to become the best player and get into the best shape I can possibly be.”
To some who have followed the team this season, those tireless hours of additional activity haven’t gone unnoticed.
“You can tell he really worked this summer,” said Tyler Lydon, Hughes’ friend and a former Orange standout. “You can definitely tell there are some smaller things that he’s tweaked that have made a huge difference in the way he’s shooting the ball and the way he’s playing in general.”
Hughes, too, has seen the evolution in his game, and mentioned he’s becoming a better shooter inside. He also said he’s getting better looks, has become a better decision-maker and is finding more scoring chances.
He hopes those improvements translate to more wins this season and a deep run into the NCAA tournament.
Those are the two short-term goals Hughes has in mind. The long-term future, however, is yet to be determined.
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SU has sold more than 31,000 tickets for Duke game (PS; Ditota)
Syracuse has sold upwards of 31,000 tickets to the Duke game Saturday, when the Blue Devils visit the Carrier Dome for an 8 p.m. contest.
That number will likely grow.
“I think we’re going to anticipate as we do with any game having a pretty good walk-up,” said Anthony DiFino, SU’s associate athletics director/business development. “We don’t know what that number looks like, but we’re going to be over 31,000. And with last night, still winning 5 of our last 6, I think we have a pretty motivated fan base. And we’re still seeing them show their support.”
Last year, SU set a record for the largest on-campus crowd in college basketball history when Duke played in the Dome. (Zion Williamson was a huge draw in CBB last year, though he was injured for the Syracuse game.) That crowd numbered 35,642. Syracuse-Duke at the Dome has set attendance records every time that game has been played on a weekend.
Duke is 17-3 overall and 7-2 in the ACC after its defeat of Pittsburgh Tuesday night. SU is 13-8 and 6-4, having lost at Clemson Tuesday. The Orange had won five straight before its one-point defeat in South Carolina.
Weekend games always drive attendance and weather, too, factors into the equation. The Weather Channel is forecasting clear skies and relatively warm temperatures for Saturday, which could motivate fans to show up. The game will be televised by ESPN.
“Projections are always tough,” DiFino said, while acknowledging Saturday’s Duke game seems better situated for walk-up crowds than, say, a 9 p.m. Tuesday game against any opponent.
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Joe Girard provided a silver lining in SU’s loss to Clemson (PS; Waters)
Syracuse’s loss to Clemson on Tuesday hurt more than the average loss.
The game had come down to the final second -- literally the final second -- as Syracuse inbounded the ball one last time with 0.9 seconds on the clock.
An Elijah Hughes’ desperation heave fell short, and the SU players and coaches shuffled out of Littlejohn Coliseum with a 71-70 loss.
In the game’s final minute, Syracuse missed all three of its shots, including an inbounds lob from Buddy Boeheim to Hughes that nearly worked, and turned the ball over once.
Marek Dolezaj and Bourama Sidibe had both fouled out, an issue that has been a problem before.
Hughes scored 22 points, but from the start of the second half until the 3-minute mark, he fell silent and had just three points in that span. Buddy Boeheim had also scored 22 points, but he needed a career-high 21 field goal attempts to get there.
Syracuse’s five-game win streak came to an end in a collision of what-if scenarios.
But one good thing might have come out of the Orange’s loss to the Tigers.
For the last 20 minutes of the game, Joe Girard played like Joe Girard again. The freshman guard busted out of a three-game mini-slump to score 10 second-half points. He scored eight of his points in the game’s last six minutes, scoring on a drive and hitting a pair of 3-pointers, the second to give Syracuse a 70-67 lead.
“Joe made some big buckets at the end when they got the lead,’’ SU coach Jim Boeheim said.
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Three Takeaways from SU’s Heartbreaking Loss to Clemson – Orange Fizz – Free Syracuse Recruiting News (orangefizz.net; Bonaparte)
Syracuse suffered a devastating loss to Clemson last night. Instead of extending the win streak to 6, the Orange end up on the wrong side of 1 point heartbreaker. Let’s try to move on, here’s what we learned about SU during that game.
There’s a Real Problem Down Low:
All season there’s been a conversation surrounding SU’s big man situation. There have been questions asking whether or not Bourama Sidibe is good enough to man the 5 spot, or if Marek Dolezaj should just slot in there because at least he’s been consistently effective. Against Clemson it didn’t matter who was down low, there was no stopping the Clemson big men. The Orange were outrebounded 36-26, that’s unacceptable for any team. Sidibe and Doelzaj contributed just 7 of those boards, with 10 combined points and both fouled out. How can a team compete when both of its only reliable big men are turning in empty performances like this?
This is a Team of Fighters:
SU didn’t get the result it wanted in this game, nor did the team play particularly well down the stretch. One thing to take away as a positive for Syracuse fans is the heart this team displayed. Joe Girard didn’t have a good game, just 10 points and 1 assist, but he came in clutch when it mattered. The freshman drilled a deep three with less than 2 minutes left in the game to put the Orange ahead by 3, then just a minute later, SU leading by 1, Girard strips Clemson’s Aamir Simms on his way to the basket. It wasn’t only Girard though, Buddy Boeheim and Elijah Hughes hit clutch shots down the stretch as well. The fight and clutch attitude this team exudes is something for Orange fans to look forward to.
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Bracketology Bubble Watch: Alabama, Syracuse rising into consideration (bustingbrackets.com; Harkins)
Selection Sunday is approaching in under two months. Alabama and Syracuse have been two of the biggest risers on the bracketology bubble watch as of late.
The Bracketology Bubble Watch is back after taking a brief hiatus last week (I was sick and didn’t have time). As per usual, this update will analyze every single team currently in the at-large conversation for the NCAA Tournament. Now that Selection Sunday is under two months away, it’s time to pay serious attention to each team’s resume and where they stand in the grand scheme of the college basketball landscape at this point in time.
Of course, there are still several weeks left for teams to make substantial moves (both positively and negatively) but this will provide a nice snapshot of the bubble as it stands. Each team under consideration for an at-large bid for my bracketology projected fields has been lumped into one of four categories based on their current standing and there is a resume breakdown for everyone that is not currently anointed a “lock” to dance.
Here is a quick reminder of the categories…
Bubble Watch Categories:
Lead-pipe lock: Barring a massive collapse, these teams are sure-fire NCAA Tournament teams.
Firmly in the field: Through the first two months of the season, these teams have put together strong resumes and would not be sweating whatsoever if Selection Sunday was right now. They cannot, though, lose a bunch of games in a row and still remain safe.
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Ed Hardin: Halfway home in a strange basketball season for the ACC (journalnow.com; Hardin)
We’ve reached the halfway point of the ACC schedule, and things are about what we expected, right?
Yeah, right.
Granted, there’s half a league schedule to go, but we know now what we didn’t know at any point from early fall until about three weeks ago: The ACC, like all of college basketball, is in a strange place.
Even Mike Krzyzewski has been driven to distraction, admonishing the Cameron Indoor Stadium students while misunderstanding the intention behind a chant.
From the good and the bad to the ugly, the league is not unlike any other league in the country. The main takeaway as we head into February is that the greatest league in college basketball history has become average.
We could see it coming, and yet we couldn’t believe it would be quite like this. We knew every single player from last season's All-ACC first and second teams were gone. That’s never happened before. And we knew the big names at all the best programs nationwide were gone. And we’d even heard that the talent coming in wasn’t going to be all that.
And that turned out to be true. Even the one player who could’ve transcended all that, Carolina freshman Cole Anthony, was having a terrible time of it before he went down with a knee injury.
Take away his breakout debut against Notre Dame, and Anthony was 44-of-128 from the field, 16-of-51 from beyond the arc.
And he was considered by some to be the best player in the country.
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Quick Recap: Notre Dame Men’s Basketball Beat Wake Forest, 90-80 (onefootdown.com; Kelly)
Tonight the Wake Forest Demon Deacons made their way to the Purcell Pavilion to face the Notre Dame Fighting Irish. This was the 10th meeting for the Irish and the Demon Deacons, with the Irish leading the all-time series (going into the game) 5-4, and leading the ACC regular season series 5-2. Tonight’s game was the first of a three-game home stand for the Irish, who will face Georgia Tech on Saturday, February 1st (at noon EST), and Pittsburgh on Wednesday, February 5th (at 6:30pm EST).
How did the Irish perform tonight? Lets take a look. Wake Forest came out to a quick start, already up 9-2 at 16:35. Juwan Durham got the first bucket for the Irish, and then Prentiss Hubb missed three shots early on, but the Irish are not a team to give up and at 15:50 Nate Laszewski made the dunk to bring the score to 9-4 (Wake Forest). Durham made his second jumper at 15:10 to get the Irish within three (9-6), but the Deacon Demons don’t take their foot off the gas and quickly went up 12-6. Seton Hall’s Olivier Sarr already with seven points on the board.
Notre Dame finally got the three point shots going at 13:11 with a three by Laszewski, followed by a three by Rex Pfluerger. And once the threes started falling, Notre Dame’s momentum heated up. After a two-point jumper and a free throw shot by Dane Goodwin, the Irish were only down by two, 19-17 (12:03)
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ACC Roundup - Virginia Making A Move? (DBR; King)
In Tuesday night’s ACC action, Georgia Tech beat Morehouse 82-54, Miami took Virginia Tech, 71-61, Clemson nipped Syracuse 71-70 and Virginia upset #6 Florida State 61-56.
Wednesday’s ACC Action
- Wake Forest @ Notre Dame || 7:00 || ACCN
- Louisville @ Boston College || 9:00 || ACCN
- Virginia 61 Florida State 56
- Duke 79 Pitt 67
- Clemson 61 Syracuse 60
- Georgia Tech 82 Morehouse 54
- Miami 71 Virginia Tech 61
Kihei Clark, by basketball standards, is a tiny guy. Yet he made the critical play in this game with a beautiful reverse layup in traffic. It wasn’t the first time he’s won a game for Virginia and it won’t be the last.
He’s certainly not perfect - he’s had a turnover issue this season for one and had four in this one - but as Leonard Hamilton said afterwards, “[h]e might be small in stature, but he has the biggest heart in the ACC. Guys like that have that special ‘it factor’ that you can’t really identify, but he has it.”
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Other
Chris Stapleton coming to St. Joe’s Amp in Syracuse with Sheryl Crow (PS; Herbert)
Chris Stapleton is coming to Syracuse this summer.
The “Tennessee Whiskey” singer will perform at the St. Joseph’s Health Amphitheater at Lakeview on Friday, July 24. Special guests Sheryl Crow and Kendell Marvel will open the show at 7 p.m.
Tickets go on sale Friday, Feb. 7 at 10 a.m. through LiveNation.com, Ticketmaster and the Solvay Bank Box Office at Oncenter. Prices range from $39.75 to $99.75; a limited number of lawn four-packs will also be available.
It’s the 18th concert announced at the St. Joe’s Amp for the 2020 season, and Stapleton’s first time playing the venue. The Grammy-winning country singer-songwriter played CMAC last year, and Darien Lake and SPAC in 2018.
Stapleton will also perform at the Darien Lake Amphitheater on July 23.
St. Joseph’s Health Amphitheater at Lakeview 2020 lineup
- May 31: Zac Brown Band
- June 5: Sugarland with special guests TBA
- June 11: Thomas Rhett with Cole Swindell and Hardy
- June 26: Kidz Bop Live
- July 3: Steely Dan with Steve Winwood
- July 5: The Doobie Brothers with The Dirty Dozen Brass Band
- July 10: Tim McGraw with Midland, Ingrid Andress
- July 19: Matchbox Twenty with The Wallflowers
- July 22: Dave Matthews Band
- July 24: Chris Stapleton with Sheryl Crow, Kendell Marvel
- July 29: Nickelback with Stone Temple Pilots
- July 30: Hall & Oates with Squeeze, KT Tunstall
- Aug. 5: Foreigner with Kansas, Europe
- Aug. 7: Brad Paisley with Jordan Davis and Gabby Barrett
- Aug. 8: Disturbed with Staind, Bad Wolves
- Aug. 13: Jason Aldean with Brett Young, Mitchell Tenpenny and Dee Jay Silver
- Aug. 20: Kenny Chesney with Michael Franti & Spearhead
- Sept. 6: Lady Antebellum with Jake Owen and Maddie & Tae
