Pitarresi: Orange near-perfect vs. ASU

Syracuse University didn’t play quite a perfect game against Arizona State.

 

Just almost.

 

If there were flaws in the Orange’s 78-67 NCAA basketball tournament victory over the Sun Devils today, they weren’t easy to find.

 

SU did let ASU back into the game, yielding eight straight points as the Sun Devils made it 61-57 with 6:35 left, but the Orange response was swift and sure. Andy Rautins bombed a 3-pointer, Eric Devendorf canned two more, the lead shot up to 13 points with four minutes to play, and it was all over.

 

The Orange did a lot of things right in this one, and their confidence has to be boiling over as they head to Memphis for a date with Oklahoma in the South Regional.

 

They got solid contributions from all seven guys who played, and improved dramatically over their shabby second-half effort in Friday’s first-round victory over Stephen F. Austin. SU played very good defense, except for losing ASU sharpshooter Rihards Kuksiks too many times, shot the ball well overall and from 3-point range (26 of 47 and 9 of 20), had a modest 10 turnovers, and won the rebounding battle (30-23). And they played smart.

 

You have to wonder about ASU, though.

 

It was stunning how the Sun Devils didn’t have a clue on how to attack SU’s 2-3 zone, but it seems the teams that do, like Villanova, Pitt and Louisville, are the ones who play SU all the time. ASU rarely got the ball inside, had very few easy baskets, and got only 24 minutes out of star forward Jeff Pendergraph before he fouled out with more than 10 minutes to play. They also received a perplexingly mediocre game from first-team All-American and Pac-10 player of the year James Harden, who made just two of 10 shots, scored 10 points, and had six rebounds and five assists.

 

Harden’s performance wasn’t anywhere near as bad as what UNLV’s Stacey Augmon manufactured in the 1991 NCAA semifinals against Duke – perhaps the worst effort or maybe non-effort by a great player in tournament history - but he didn’t deliver when his team needed him badly against a superior opponent, and didn’t look capable of delivering except for a flash here and there. If Kuksiks hadn’t been on early, this game would have been a 30-point blowout.

 

Also, Herb’s Sendek’s match-up zone didn’t bother SU at all. The Sun Devils looked more confused by it than the Orange did.

 

SU won without Jonny Flynn having a great game, just a very good one.  Rautins and Devendorf were deadly, Arinze Onuaku and Rick Jackson were very effective inside early, Paul Harris had only one basket but grabbed seven rebounds, and Kristof Ongenaet came in and did his usual dirty work and had five rebounds.

 

SU will have its hands full with Blake Griffin and Oklahoma, but, again, the confidence level has to be tremendous going into that game.