Syracuse Falls to Georgia Tech

By Jared Barton ATLANTA, G.A. — Syracuse could not pull off the comeback against Georgia Tech at the McCamish Pavilion as the Yellow Jackets downed the Orange 71-65 on Sunday.

After taking a close 32-29 lead at halftime, SU could not find an answer for the GT offense, who exploded for 42 points in the 2nd half. After the game, Head Coach Jim Boeheim pinned the lack of execution on the offense.

“I thought our offense killed us,” Boeheim said. “We didn’t get as good of movement against our matchup as we needed to. When we got some good looks, we missed. We got it inside to Tyler Lydon and he had two really good looks around the basket. I thought he got fouled but that’s the way it goes sometimes, Can’t miss those when you are in tough games. Can’t do that.”

Taurean Thompson led the team in scoring with 18 points and Andrew White was right behind him with 17, but most of the scoring from those two players came in the first half. Thus Battle quietly reached double figures with 11 points.

Syracuse did not have a defensive answer for Georgia Tech big man Ben Lammers. The center dropped 23 points to lead all scorers in the game and shot an impressive 11/18 from the field. Lammers also finished the game with 7 blocks and 7 rebounds.

SU had a chance late in the second half to tie the game. GT led by as many as 13 points with just over three minutes left in the game. Syracuse crawled back and had the game within reach at 67-65 with 56 seconds remaining. But timely free throws on forced fouls led to the eventual six point win for the Yellow Jackets.

“We just dug ourselves a hole,” Coach Boeheim said. “I thought we fought back as hard as we could and got it back to a game where we could tie, but it got away. That’s what happens sometimes.”

With just three regular season games remaining, Syracuse takes on a strong Duke team in the Carrier Dome on Wednesday night. Louisville and another date with Georgia Tech are the other two remaining games.

A few bracketologists had the Orange as one of the “last four in” to the NCAA tournament this past week. It is yet to be determined exactly how this loss with effect the tournament hopes for SU. If Syracuse can win two of the last three games, there is a strong possibility that the team will make it to the big dance. One win would make the future bleak and losing all three would almost guarantee a trip to the NIT.