Rosemont, Ill. – Let’s all relax here. Yes, yesterday’s game against DePaul wasn’t pretty. It will not make the video montage airing Syracuse highlights before every home game. It will not be a moment that Syracuse fans will use to boast about their squad.

What yesterday’s game was, though, was a win. Simple as that. A win on the road in the Big East. A win that improved No. 4 Syracuse to 21-1 on the season and 8-1 in conference play. A win that insures that Syracuse will at least move up one spot in the national poll after the University of John Wall lost to South Carolina Tuesday. A win that boosted the Orange to 5-0 in Big East road games for the first time since 1999-2000. A win that puts the Orange’s winning streak at eight games. Need I say more?

‘When you play in this league, you’re going to have games like this where you don’t play well on the road,’ Syracuse head coach Jim Boeheim said. ‘And when you get to those situations, you have to find some way to win and today we found a way.’

Syracuse was due for a letdown game at some point. It had won seven straight, but there had been some minor flaws shown along the way. It almost let West Virginia steal a win after the Mountaineers trailed by double digits in the final two minutes. Marquette nearly did the same. Syracuse let Georgetown lead 14-0 in the first minutes on Monday night’s game.

Even with those lapses, the Orange still found a way to win those games. No matter what you could nitpick, Syracuse emerged triumphant and Saturday wasn’t any different.

The Orange played poorly on offense, missing plenty of open jump shots and – to be frank – was outplayed by the much less talented Blue Demons. It trailed by 18 on the road and didn’t secure a lead until there were fewer than four minutes to play.

Still, Syracuse found a way to pull this game out. Good teams can have bad performances like Saturday’s and win those games. Elite teams can spot the opposition a large lead and come back. That’s what Syracuse did. It overcame the hole it dug itself and won a basketball game. When the week was over, Syracuse was 2-0.

‘(DePaul) made a big point saying they could hang with these guys,’ Kris Joseph said, referring to the rest of the Orange. ‘It doesn’t matter what we’re ranked in the country. This is the Big East and in the Big East anything’s possible, so what we had to do is play good basketball and stay focused on the task at hand.’

One factor that wasn’t talked about after the game that probably seeped through onto the floor was the opponent. Monday night, Syracuse played a critical game in its schedule, an ESPN Big Monday home game against archrival No. 7 Georgetown at the Carrier Dome. The players were pumped, the fans were amped and Syracuse had its biggest win of the season.

And what follows that game? A trip to the Windy City to take on 8-12 DePaul. Not exactly a game you get amped up for. When the whistle blew, it showed. SU was flat for most of the game and looked like it wanted to get back to Syracuse as quickly as possible. Can you blame the team? It’s impossible to get amped up for every game on the schedule. DePaul is a team Syracuse should beat even if it starts its backups. The energy wasn’t there, and it translated. We can give the Orange a free pass. If this persists against Providence, then there’s a problem.

While this game certainly is fresh on your mind, don’t let it take away from what Syracuse has accomplished. Outside of Pittsburgh, it has beaten every team it’s faced, and has lived up to the challenge. It was one week ago it beat a Georgetown team that clobbered Duke at home Saturday. The Orange had a down game and still won.

Great teams struggle along the way. Saturday’s game was a struggle, but Syracuse still won the game.

It’s not so bad after all.

Matt Ehalt is a staff writer at The Daily Orange, where his columns appear occasionally. He can be reached at mrehalt@syr.edu.

Published on January 31, 2010 at 12:00 pm