Six of last week's top 10...

[RMH44]

teams (Arizona, SDSU, 'Nova, Kansas ,MSU and Cinncinnati) lost last week. Duke won by a point at home against Maryland and were lucky that the Terp's last shot barely rolled off the rim at the buzzer.

I really think we need to keep our close wins in perspective. Most teams that play in a REAL conference go through tough games late in their conference schedule. It is what it is!

Add Duke and SU to list above and that's 8 of the top 10 teams had very difficult games. Even Florida, who has been playing well, could have lost their game against Tenn.

We need to stop all the hand wringing...we'll be just fine. Lets get a comfortable early lead against BC and get "My Three Sons" into the game and save the legs of the top 6 players for Saturday. Hopefully, Baye is ready to play but I hope they limit his minutes and save him for Saturday as well.

 

[Orangeyes]

There should have a new No.1 in the Associated Poll this week but...

 

[PhatOrange]

This is what I'm talking about. It's bizarre. Syracuse is lucky and over-rated but Wichita State is not. From that article.

"call it lucky orange as Syracuse barely survive two horrific games of the week to stay unbeaten at 25-0"

"The Orange maybe will get a pass for avoiding an upset but they struggle again by edging North Carolina State 56-55 on Saturday night. No one will be surprise if they will lose this week when they face another strong challenge against No.8 Duke."

"it’s time for Wichita Shockers to get some respect in improving to 27-0 this week and move them at second place. Forget about big conference teams when the No.1 team from Missouri Valley Conference deserves credit after reaching the Final Four last April."

Syracuse IS a big conference team and ALSO reached the FF last year. People are now acting like 25-0 is a lucky fluke. Yet WS deserves repect? They play in whatever the the missouri valley is.

 

[CusefanATL]

We need to stop all the hand wringing...we'll be just fine. Lets get a comfortable early lead against BC and get "My Three Sons" into the game and save the legs of the top 6 players for Saturday. Hopefully, Baye is ready to play but I hope they limit his minutes and save him for Saturday as well.

The only early lead I can remember was @ miami. And that didnt even go easy.

 

[CorduroyG]

There should have a new No.1 in the Associated Poll this week but...

That's comical. 2 horrific games? What a moron.

 

[RMH44]

This is what I'm talking about. It's bizarre. Syracuse is lucky and over-rated but Wichita State is not. From that article.

"call it lucky orange as Syracuse barely survive two horrific games of the week to stay unbeaten at 25-0"

"The Orange maybe will get a pass for avoiding an upset but they struggle again by edging North Carolina State 56-55 on Saturday night. No one will be surprise if they will lose this week when they face another strong challenge against No.8 Duke."

"it’s time for Wichita Shockers to get some respect in improving to 27-0 this week and move them at second place. Forget about big conference teams when the No.1 team from Missouri Valley Conference deserves credit after reaching the Final Four last April."

Syracuse IS a big conference team and ALSO reached the FF last year. People are now acting like 25-0 is a lucky fluke. Yet WS deserves repect? They play in whatever the the missouri valley is.

I think way too many people are forgetting that Pitt was favored to win at home against SU. Pitt is very offensively challenged but they seem to put together great efforts against our zone. They played their two best games of the year -vs- SU and still lost. BTW, Jamie Dixon is still a dick.

 

[JOC44]

This is what I'm talking about. It's bizarre. Syracuse is lucky and over-rated but Wichita State is not. From that article.

"call it lucky orange as Syracuse barely survive two horrific games of the week to stay unbeaten at 25-0"

"The Orange maybe will get a pass for avoiding an upset but they struggle again by edging North Carolina State 56-55 on Saturday night. No one will be surprise if they will lose this week when they face another strong challenge against No.8 Duke."

"it’s time for Wichita Shockers to get some respect in improving to 27-0 this week and move them at second place. Forget about big conference teams when the No.1 team from Missouri Valley Conference deserves credit after reaching the Final Four last April."

Someone tell that idiot (not you, Phat, the author of the article you posted) that the past tense is his friend.

 

[Oakland]

Duke was also helped out a lot by the refs screwing up the possession arrow.

teams (Arizona, SDSU, 'Nova, Kansas ,MSU and Cinncinnati) lost last week. Duke won by a point at home against Maryland and were lucky that the Terp's last shot barely rolled off the rim at the buzzer.

I really think we need to keep our close wins in perspective. Most teams that play in a REAL conference go through tough games late in their conference schedule. It is what it is!

Add Duke and SU to list above and that's 8 of the top 10 teams had very difficult games. Even Florida, who has been playing well, could have lost their game against Tenn.

We need to stop all the hand wringing...we'll be just fine. Lets get a comfortable early lead against BC and get "My Three Sons" into the game and save the legs of the top 6 players for Saturday. Hopefully, Baye is ready to play but I hope they limit his minutes and save him for Saturday as well.

 

[Scotch]

There should have a new No.1 in the Associated Poll this week but...

A deranged man wrote that from his mother's basement. We're going to have to pick our battles on this "no respect" thing.

 

[HarrisonJBounel]

A deranged man wrote that from his mother's basement. We're going to have to pick our battles on this "no respect" thing.

Yeah, a writer doesn't get notoriety if he makes the logical choice and says SU is #1. It's only the desperate attention whores who write this kind of crap.

 

[two3zone]

I'm sick of hearing about "Witchita State getting credit for the final four". I'm sorry, but that was last season, you don't get any sort of credit for what you did last year this year.

What any team did last year, Syracuse included, really has no baring on what I think about this year.

 

[Waltdods]

I'm sick of hearing about "Witchita State getting credit for the final four". I'm sorry, but that was last season, you don't get any sort of credit for what you did last year this year.

What any team did last year, Syracuse included, really has no baring on what I think about this year.

I think this is true as a general rule, but kind of think Wichita State is the exception. Because normally you'd look at this 27-0 record by a mid-major against mid-majors and say "Yea, but who knows how they're going to play against the big guys?" But basically the same team has already proven it can translate to playing against the big guys. It doesn't validate the 27-0 exactly, but it makes it harder to argue this team is just a function of a poor schedule.

 

[rrlbees]

We're lucky because WE made 2 great plays at the end of the game (one of which was on the road where we weren't favored) and yet Duke wasn't lucky when they beat a team at home by 1 when the OTHER team missed a buzzer bearing 5 footer that rolled arond the rim and off and were just earlier helped by an admitted refs mistake giving Duke and extra possession.

I'd say Duke was luckier.

 

[Tony DeFranco]

We need to worry about ourselves and quit worrying about why we are better than other teams because they are winning close games too - reality is we have been playing very lethargic - we are somewhat anemic on offense (for a top team) and rely on our defense which requires a balls to the wall type of mentality - we need to get back to that energy level where we can create a few steals which our guards are excellent at and get a few transition points that would really be the difference in some of these games

 

[cto]

Virtually anyone on this board could have written a better, more insightful article than that. Anyone can start his own blog and become a self-appointed "expert." The internet really is the new "wild west."

 

[Garbs]

teams (Arizona, SDSU, 'Nova, Kansas ,MSU and Cinncinnati) lost last week. Duke won by a point at home against Maryland and were lucky that the Terp's last shot barely rolled off the rim at the buzzer.

I really think we need to keep our close wins in perspective. Most teams that play in a REAL conference go through tough games late in their conference schedule. It is what it is!

Add Duke and SU to list above and that's 8 of the top 10 teams had very difficult games. Even Florida, who has been playing well, could have lost their game against Tenn.

We need to stop all the hand wringing...we'll be just fine. Lets get a comfortable early lead against BC and get "My Three Sons" into the game and save the legs of the top 6 players for Saturday. Hopefully, Baye is ready to play but I hope they limit his minutes and save him for Saturday as well.

imagine if we lost two games last week

 

[Col. Bleep]

That's comical. 2 horrific games? What a moron.

But who cares? Who is this guy who wrote the article? Could just as easily have been any of us with a different take.

Bottom line: 25-0.

Period.

 

[RMH44]

imagine if we lost two games last week

I'm reasonably we'll lose a game or two. That's fine as long as we win our last game.

 

[longtimefan]

Virtually anyone on this board could have written a better, more insightful article than that. Anyone can start his own blog and become a self-appointed "expert." The internet really is the new "wild west."

The use of English in that piece makes me think it was written by one of the folks I deal with when I'm having tech problems and I get routed to a boiler room in Bangalore.

 

[bballbeadle]

There should have a new No.1 in the Associated Poll this week but...

This was poorly written with several mistakes. I am not impressed!

 

[Coach Orange]

teams (Arizona, SDSU, 'Nova, Kansas ,MSU and Cinncinnati) lost last week. Duke won by a point at home against Maryland and were lucky that the Terp's last shot barely rolled off the rim at the buzzer.

I really think we need to keep our close wins in perspective. Most teams that play in a REAL conference go through tough games late in their conference schedule. It is what it is!

Add Duke and SU to list above and that's 8 of the top 10 teams had very difficult games. Even Florida, who has been playing well, could have lost their game against Tenn.

We need to stop all the hand wringing...we'll be just fine. Lets get a comfortable early lead against BC and get "My Three Sons" into the game and save the legs of the top 6 players for Saturday. Hopefully, Baye is ready to play but I hope they limit his minutes and save him for Saturday as well.

Well said. A few weeks ago, I asked, "Since when is winning every game by 20 the criterion for labeling a team "strong" or "deserving"?" I'll ask it again.

It seems that many fans and talking heads dismiss or fail to recognize several factors that your post implies:

• Offense tends to come and go in basketball. A team can do the right things offensively and still miss good shots. Suffocating defense, though, shows up consistently--game in and game out. Teams that play solid defense tend to be steadier.

• Statistical measures and rankings mean little to nothing in one-game scenarios. Unfortunately for stat worshipers, that's how games are played. One game at a time. The NCAA Tourney is the ultimate in this exercise.

• The losses/close games by top-ten teams point to the fact that top-ten teams are just not as good as they were 20 years ago. There are no John Wooden UCLA or Christian Laettner/Bobby Hurley/Grant Hill Duke teams anymore.

• The "middling" teams in the major conferences are still pretty good teams.

• The top teams in some mid-major conferences would still be very good teams in major conferences. However, Wichita State would likely not be undefeated (though it is possible) in the ACC or another major conference. We are.

• Florida is a very good team. So is Syracuse. So is Michigan State, Duke, Kansas, Arizona (even with Ashley's injury), and Louisville. Kentucky, Nova, Cincy, San Diego State, St. Louis, and Creighton aren't slouches ("Don't sell yourself short, Judge--you're a tremendous slouch."). Any of 7-10 teams could legitimately win the title, though it is likely the winner comes from a set of five or six. Syracuse is one of those five or six.

• The talking heads remind fans constantly that Michigan State has injuries. So does Arizona. Well, so does Syracuse. It's easy to forget/ignore that Baye has been out during our "miraculous" week, and that DCII was getting minutes earlier in the year. I haven't seen this consistently mentioned when writers, talking heads, or fans discuss how "overrated" we are.

• One-and-done tournaments are flukey. Winning every game by 30 is no guarantee that we don't lose in the Sweet 16 to a sharp-shooting team. Hence, this desire to see a "dominating" performance night-in and night-out doesn't correlate to potential tournament success or championships, despite the argument by those implying that it does.

• The other team is trying to win the game, too.

• Therefore, winning games is not easy, no matter whom you play. Cream tends to rise to the top (I shudder as I write that cliche), but it doesn't every time. The fact that we have risen to the top 25 straight times is remarkable in the current college basketball climate. If it was so easy, more than two teams would be undefeated right now, and the wait for an undefeated champion to emerge in college hoops would be much shorter.

I will end this post (which is longer than I intended--sorry) with the thought I posited a few weeks ago: enjoy this special season--they don't come along all that often. SUball