MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Minutes after an embarrassed Syracuse team sulked off the court after its defeat to West Virginia, Orange head coach Jim Boeheim didn’t seem so much concerned with the win-loss implication of the contest.

After watching his team play from well behind for the second straight outing, he just wanted to see his team in the game.

‘I think obviously it’s very tough to win on the road but right now we’re not even competing,’ Boeheim said.

Five days after the Orange spent 40 minutes playing a futile game of catch-up in a loss to Cincinnati, Syracuse’s bid for a successful end to its two-game road swing against West Virginia was derailed before it really had a chance to get on track.

The Orange (12-5, 2-2 Big East) was blown out of West Virginia Coliseum, 81-61, Sunday afternoon in front of 13,560 fans, thanks to a poor offensive performance that included a meager 20-point effort in the first half – the lowest single-half output all season for the Orange.

The Orange’s second straight loss dropped it into the muddled middle of the Big East pack with a 2-2 conference record ahead of Wednesday’s home contest against Rutgers (7 p.m., ESPN Regional).

Certainly, an away loss against a West Virginia team receiving votes in both national pools is a forgivable result, but no doubt the Orange didn’t expect to get run out of the gym as it did on Sunday. By the time the buzzer sounded and the Mountaineer mascot’s rifle exploded to signal the halftime break, Syracuse was already down 15.

Syracuse shot just 30.4 percent (7-for-23) from the field in the frame against a West Virginia defense that swarmed to the ball and allowed the Orange no room to operate anywhere on the court.

The Mountaineers (12-4, 2-2) played a pressure, man-to-man defense that extended the passing lanes and denied any passes to the wing. It was a defense that seemed to fluster SU’s freshmen backcourt of Jonny Flynn and Scoop Jardine. Flynn tallied 11 points, but he recorded just one assist compared to six turnovers. Jardine had four points, three turnovers and no assists.

‘They kept us to 20 points in one half, they had to be doing something (right),’ said SU forward Paul Harris, who added 12 points. ‘But at the same time we weren’t doing what we were supposed to do … a lot of it was us not moving.’

Arinze Onuaku, who endured a dismal, three-point outing against Cincinnati, led the Orange in scoring with 15, yet all but four of those points came in the second half when the game’s outcome wasn’t in much doubt. Donte Greene struggled, contributing just 10 points on 3-of-12 shooting.

‘I thought our defensive intensity was good,’ WVU head coach Bob Huggins said. ‘We thought we could come out and play man and we did the entire game.’

Oftentimes Syracuse struggled to get a shot off, committing 10 turnovers in the first half and 19 for the game, compared to just eight total assists.

West Virginia capitalized on SU’s struggles with a 13-2 run over the half’s final 4:37, capped off when WVU’s John Flowers tipped in a missed 3-pointer from sharpshooter Alex Ruoff as the half expired to give West Virginia a 35-20 edge.

Misses didn’t come often for Ruoff and Mountaineer guard Darris Nichols, both of whom frequently created open looks on the perimeter. Ruoff had a game-best 23 points, shooting 7-of-11 from beyond the arc.

‘We did a good job in the zone until they broke down against Ruoff,’ Boeheim said. ‘We didn’t want Ruoff to be the guy that beat our zone.

Any chance of a dynamic comeback for the Orange had all but vanished in the opening minutes of the second half because of Syracuse’s turnover problems. The Orange threw the ball away on four of its first five possessions after the halftime break and WVU scored seven straight points to make it 42-21 at the 18:34 mark.

And as the game deteriorated, visible frustration began to set in for Syracuse. Flynn languished back on defense midway through the half after missing a dunk, while Arinze Onuaku frequently exchanged shoves down low with the Mountaineer big men.

‘Anytime you’re down 20-30 points, teams get frustrated, but you saw them out there,’ WVU forward Wellington Smith said. ‘You saw number 21 (Onuaku) pushing us, trying to be a bully.’

The game seemed yet another indictment of the young Orange’s inexperience, and after the game the SU players seemed relieved to be retreating back to the Carrier Dome and its more friendly inhabitants.

It’s a more familiar atmosphere Boeheim hopes will remedy some of his team’s mistake-ridden play.

‘I’m not disappointed so much that we’ve lost these two games, we haven’t executed,’ Boehiem said. ‘We just didn’t execute, and when you don’t execute and you’re a young team you start to question what you’re doing.’

Published on January 14, 2008 at 12:00 pm