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CHAPEL HILL, N.C. — In his postgame message to his Syracuse squad, Adrian Autry shifted the mindset to Tuesday at Pittsburgh.

“We got a game on Tuesday,” Autry said of his speech to his players after the 103-67 defeat. “Every team has some bad games in the season. One game doesn’t define a season whether it’s one win, one big win, or one big loss. We just got to move forward, we got to flush this out.”

Saturday’s game versus No. 7 UNC — which handed Syracuse (11-5, 2-3 Atlantic Coast Conference) its worst-ever ACC loss — was a tough task to begin with. SU was the underdog against the Tar Heels, that was known. It wasn’t expected to win, especially on the road at a venue where the program has never been victorious against a top-10 team.

But the Orange didn’t give itself a chance — they were outclassed from the beginning with effort and hustle lacking at times. They weren’t expected to win, but they weren’t expected to lose by 36.

Autry’s mindset is understandable and predicted as Syracuse would like to move on from this game. Autry is correct that this defeat is just one game out of 31, but as the season is reviewed collectively, the Orange’s defeats have proven they aren’t ready for the NCAA Tournament. They have lost by a margin of 22.5 points to either NCAA Tournament teams or teams (Virginia) on the bubble, per ESPN Bracketology.

And this 36-point midseason loss to UNC questions whether Syracuse can win the ACC games it’s supposed to as well as the ones where it can go one way or the other — the games that Syracuse can bounce back on.

“At the end of the day, it’s tough,” Autry said. “It’s tough when you get down by that much with that much time on the clock left as well.”

Throughout the season, the Orange have won the games they should’ve — Georgetown along with warm-up games versus Canisius, New Hampshire and company. They’ve also won the games — like Oregon and LSU — that could go either way on paper.

But that was earlier in the season. The five-game winning streak is in the past and recent play versus ACC opponents has shown Syracuse’s potential vulnerability to losing against teams it can beat and should beat. The Orange had to come back against Boston College, a game sandwiched between blowout losses to the top two teams in the ACC.

The next three games are crucial for Syracuse. Featuring Pittsburgh, Miami and Florida State, the games are all winnable, too. Whether SU can bounce back or not in this stretch might define the rest of the season.

The game was won when…

Jalen Washington scored a second chance layup to put the Tar Heels up by 10 with 14 minutes remaining in the first half. That was the first time the lead reached double digits and the game seemed to be well out of reach. UNC’s first-half lead reached as much as 27 after Jae’Lyn Withers scored a fast-break layup. Early on in the second half, Syracuse cut the lead to 15 following a Chris Bell 3, but a 10-0 run by UNC brought the downpour back on.

Quote of the night: Autry gets it spot on

“We didn’t do a good job in any aspect.”

Autry summed the afternoon best with an obvious statement. UNC won the rebounding battle 53-30, had double the assists the Orange had, shot 11% higher from the field and had 13 steals compared to Syracuse’s seven. Autry said that this was the first game of the season where SU didn’t come off competitive in the beginning, adding that UNC was the “tougher team from the beginning.”

Stat to know: 36

The 36-point margin is the largest margin of defeat the Orange have suffered as a member of the ACC. Syracuse hadn’t lost that badly since 2006, when DePaul defeated it by 39. Five Tar Heel players scored in double figures and no UNC player played more than 27 minutes as head coach Hubert Davis felt at ease putting in his reserve players with about 10 minutes remaining.

Game ball: RJ Davis

RJ Davis, the league’s top scorer, led all scorers Saturday afternoon. He dropped 22 points on 7-of-12 shooting and also made four of the Tar Heels’ seven 3-pointers on the day.

Three Final Points

Bullied inside

Against the Orange, the Tar Heels scored the most points they have scored in a single contest against Syracuse. Fifty-eight of them came inside the paint, which is a season-high.

In the opening stretch of the game, 16 of the first 19 points came down low and were fueled by Armando Bacot, who had 16 points and 11 rebounds. Collectively, UNC also had 19 offensive rebounds, which Autry attributed to the Tar Heels’ being “tougher” than SU, and that resulted in 22 second chance points.

“We all know what Bacot can do and (Harrison) Ingram can do,” Autry said. “That’s what they do. We just didn’t do a good job of keeping bodies on. We just didn’t do a good job defensively.”

Pushing the pace

Syracuse couldn’t keep up with the Tar Heels’ pace. Whether it was the man or zone defense, UNC made it look easy breaking down the defense. And the Orange’s 17 turnovers led to quick transitions on the other end too. The Tar Heels had 23 points off SU turnovers and had 20 fast break points.

“Speeding us up led to easy buckets for them,” Justin Taylor said.

Naheem McLeod’s status

Prior to SU’s matchup with Boston College on Jan. 10, the team announced Naheem McLeod is out indefinitely because of a right-foot injury. McLeod didn’t travel with the team to Chapel Hill and Autry said he didn’t know anything “definitive” about McLeod’s status.

“We should know something soon about what he’s gonna be able to do if he’s going to able to move forward or not,” Autry said, knocking on wood.

Next up: Pittsburgh

Syracuse continues its two-game road trip at Pittsburgh, a team it defeated 81-73 at the end of December. The bench — led by Maliq Brown, Benny Williams and Quadir Copeland — scored the final 20 points for the Orange and combined for 52 bench points, which is the most since a 2016 game versus Boston University. Since then, like SU, the Panthers have also suffered defeats to Duke and North Carolina. In between, Pitt picked up an 83-70 win over Louisville.

Published on January 14, 2024 at 8:13 pm

Contact Cole: colebambini@gmail.com | @ColeBambini