UPDATE: March 13, 11:52 p.m.

A feeling of uncertainty swept over every member of Syracuse that reacted to the team’s NCAA Tournament selection on Sunday.

The unknown came from SU’s first opponent — Indiana State.

‘Larry Bird went there,’ SU point guard Scoop Jardine said Sunday, laughing, when asked if he knew anything about the Sycamores. ‘I really haven’t seen them this year.’

On Sunday, Syracuse (26-7) earned a No. 3 seed in the NCAA Tournament from the Selection Committee and a first-round date with 14th-seeded Indiana State (20-13). SU will play the Sycamores on Friday in Cleveland at approximately 9:57 p.m.

The Orange was placed in a loaded East Regional bracket that includes three other Big East teams — fifth-seeded West Virginia (21-11), ninth-seeded Villanova (21-11) and 11th-seeded Marquette (20-14). The region’s top seed is the Big Ten’s Ohio State (32-2), which won its conference tournament Sunday afternoon against Penn State. The Buckeyes are the No. 1 overall seed for the NCAA Tournament. No. 2 is North Carolina (26-7), which fell to Duke on Sunday in the ACC tournament final.

‘Just playing against (some of) those teams, you know it’s going to be a hard game,’ SU senior forward Rick Jackson said. ‘If it comes to playing against them, you just have to go out there and play hard.’

But SU’s Tournament run starts Friday against Indiana State. And the Sycamores are a team with which the entire Orange team, including Syracuse head coach Jim Boeheim, seems to be completely unfamiliar.

After the new, 68-team bracket was announced Sunday, Boeheim estimated he has watched film on all but a handful of those teams. And Indiana State is one of them.

‘I’ve seen almost everybody play,’ Boeheim said. ‘I think they might be one of the two or three teams that I haven’t seen play this year.’

Boeheim and Jardine weren’t the only ones to whom the Sycamores were unknown. SU shooting guard Brandon Triche said he was only familiar with the Sycamores’ light blue and navy blue colors.

Jackson said he didn’t know much about Indiana State, but thought it would be a ‘tough game.’

‘They made the Tournament, so you can’t take them lightly,’ Jackson said. ‘I know they’re going to be fired up to come out here and play hard.

‘They’re probably going to be a team like Butler. Butler last year made teams think they can just come in and really beat the top teams.’

The statistics tell some of the story of SU’s first opponent. Indiana State has won five consecutive games, culminating in a 60-56 win over Missouri State in the Missouri Valley Conference tournament championship last Sunday.

The Sycamores also have experience with a pair of Big East foes. They played Notre Dame to a tough 81-72 loss at South Bend, Ind., and beat DePaul at home 73-51.

‘Indiana State played very well at the end of the year,’ Boeheim said. ‘They won a tournament in a tough conference. … You have to respect what they’ve done. It’s a very tough first-round game.’

The Orange is, however, familiar with a team it could play in Cleveland in the next round. That team could be 11th-seeded Marquette, a squad it lost to on the road in Milwaukee 76-70 on Jan. 29. That loss, however, came in the midst of a four-game losing streak — and in the midst of a stretch during which Syracuse lost six of eight games. The Golden Eagles play sixth-seeded Xavier (24-7) in the first round.

For Jackson, the potential matchup is one he looks to as one in which a different SU team can avenge its earlier loss.

‘They beat us,’ Jackson said. ‘So we’re looking forward to playing those teams to sort of get the revenge back. Whoever we play, we just play and we’re going to go out there and play hard.’

For now, though, Syracuse will spend the next four days emerging itself in study of Indiana State. And for Boeheim, that started shortly after he left his press conference reacting to SU’s bid.

Said Boeheim of his preparation: ‘I’ll start tonight.’

bplogiur@syr.edu

Published on March 12, 2011 at 12:00 pm