Jim Boeheim wasn’t trying to show up the referee. That much he’s sure of. Whether he violated the NCAA’s new coaching decorum rules is another matter.

Whatever Boeheim was doing, referee Jim Burr interpreted it as an attempt to mock the official’s call. He issued Boeheim a technical foul with 8:47 left in the game after Syracuse was called for two lane violations in a row.

‘All I was trying to do was point out that the guy was hitching at his foul shot, which is illegal, and then he was shooting it,’ Boeheim said. ‘Our guys were being drawn off. These guys, they don’t want anybody to tell them anything. The rule is you’re not supposed to gesture to the official. I was just showing what he was doing.’

Boeheim said the motion he signaled to Burr, a Big East official, was an imitation of the stutter the foul shooter, Daniel Puckett, was making. Boeheim was at the edge of the coaches’ box as he was shouting to Burr, who turned around and promptly T’ed up Boeheim.

In a span of 43 seconds, Syracuse’s 11-point lead dwindled to six because of a sequence of free throws.

The technical against Boeheim was the second called against the Orange Saturday night. Jonny Flynn was called for one with 9:29 left in the game after arguing with Burr about a foul call.

‘I wasn’t talking to the ref; I was really mad at myself,’ Flynn said. ‘You saw me turn my back to the ref, and I was really just mad at myself, and I guess the ref heard me.’

Boeheim agreed it shouldn’t have been a technical.

‘Jonny committed a foul, and he made a little bit of a reaction to it,’ Boeheim said. ‘But if that’s going to be a technical all year, there’s going to be 100 technicals called.’

Wright returns

Senior point guard Josh Wright played for the first time in 19 days since Syracuse’s season opener against Siena.

In eight minutes of play in the first half, Wright attempted one shot, a 3-pointer, and missed it. He turned the ball over twice, including one 40 seconds after he came in. Wright also stole a ball.

‘It’s going to take a while,’ Boeheim said of Wright getting back into the flow of things. ‘He made a couple bad turnovers, but I thought practice yesterday was good.’

Wright missed the past five games for a myriad of reasons. He went home to Utica to be with his family when he was sick, Boeheim said earlier in the season. But since then, Syracuse athletics officials and Boeheim have said Wright had academic issues he needed to resolve before playing again.

The senior dressed Wednesday for the first time since the St. Joseph’s game, but he did not appear in the loss to Massachusetts.

‘(Wright) helped us a lot,’ the freshman Flynn said. ‘You see tonight he came in with defensive intensity. He brought it up. He’s a senior, he’s been through this for three years. That leadership on the court and experience really helps us.’

Flynn sat on the bench from the 10-minute mark until 1:36 left in the first half, when Wright came out of the game. Flynn still led the team in scoring with 17 points.

‘I think if he gets some more time, he’ll catch back up,’ Boeheim said of Wright. ‘He needs two or three more practices. He was aware of what to do, he just made a couple bad turnovers, but he wasn’t the only one.’

No subbing

All five Syracuse starters played the entire second half and four starters played 37 minutes or more, a trend that is becoming normal circumstance for the Orange.

Boeheim used a rotation of eight players, much like he has for most of the season. Wright played eight minutes, freshman center Rick Jackson played five and freshman guard Scoop Jardine three. Junior forward Kristof Ongenaet did not play, the first game he hasn’t appeared in all season.

Tulane’s bench outscored Syracuse’s, 22-2.

Boeheim said the closeness of the game and the fact that Syracuse could not put Tulane away until late had an effect on his decision not to use his bench.

‘I think it was a little bit of the pace of the game,’ Boeheim said. ‘We could never make a spurt. … The game was always on the fringe of six to eight points, and when you’re in that area and you put a couple guys in and they make a couple mistakes, now it’s four.’

Published on December 2, 2007 at 12:00 pm