If the final score and three court rushings and 30,303 hysterical fans and Josh Pace dancing shirtless on the scorer’s table — a subsequently broken scorer’s table — and Kueth Duany body surfing and Craig Forth tossing to and fro in a sea of orange and Gerry McNamara barreling through an overzealous crowd didn’t say this was a big win, Jim Boeheim did.

The Syracuse men’s basketball coach said it without a long, eloquent waxing or even a few short, memorable lines. Instead, that extra zing in his usually monotonous voice in his postgame press conference said it. So did his ruffled hair, normally so perfect. Ditto for the abundance of comical one-liners.

But most of all, Boeheim said it with what he didn’t say in the locker room afterward.

“I don’t think he yelled at us,” Forth said. “He does pretty much every time. Not this time.”

He could have, too. It would have been all-too typical of Boeheim to begin his media address by acknowledging a nice comeback, only to digress into a string of “We’re not where we need to be yet,” “Our defense needs work” and the customary “Kueth didn’t have it tonight.”

Instead, Boeheim almost immediately praised Duany — “Kueth Duany was all over the court today on defense, helping people and making plays” — and then SU’s man-to-man defense.

When he went out of his way to praise even the fans, there was no denying it. The Syracuse coach of 27 years and 637 victories was pumped.

When Boeheim finished his opening remarks, he paused to collect his breath and ran his hand through his out-of-place and receding hair, perhaps disheveled in the postgame celebration.

He must have been exhausted by that point. He’d already hollered at referee Ed Corbett during an SU timeout with 2:03 remaining in the game.

Of course, it’s nothing new to see Boeheim marching along the sideline and spewing his opinions into an official’s tired ear. It’s equally common to see him walk over to an official at a timeout to further the discussion.

But this being a big game, Boeheim gave Corbett a larger-than-normal piece of his mind. He shouted loudly enough to be heard across the court and had to be pushed back into the huddle by freshman Carmelo Anthony.

“Coach is one of the most exciting guys on the sidelines,” said former Syracuse guard Allen Griffin, who played for Boeheim from 1997 to 2001. “His demeanor might not show it, but the way he talks to the refs, you can see it.”

At the, well, second end of the game, after Pitt guard Brandin Knight buried a 3-pointer a heartbeat after the final buzzer sounded, Boeheim moved into action again. He grabbed the microphone and ordered, in a loud, screeching voice, the fans to get the hell off the court.

“Calm down,” he commanded. “Get off the court! Let us figure out what happened here.”

So perhaps it’s no surprise that toward the end of his press conference, the zip in Boeheim’s voice waned. He started taking long pauses.

And he changed topics, too. He noted those missed second-half layups. He bemoaned Syracuse’s poor shooting in the Big East.

And he declared that a new game, another big one too, tips off tonight.

Pete Iorizzo is the sports editor at The Daily Orange, where his columns appear regularly. E-mail him at pniorizz@syr.edu.

Published on February 2, 2003 at 12:00 pm