SALT LAKE CITY — Face to face, Jim Boeheim and Rick Jackson stared at each other in a familiar portrait. One preaching, the other in disbelief.

Only this wasn’t the court. And this had nothing to do with foul trouble. Nothing to do with basketball. Tears pouring out of his eyes, Jackson wept and wheezed. Boeheim consoled him.

Nobody in this room ever expected the script to take such a dark turn.

‘We fought and came back,’ Jackson mumbled, ‘but we needed that little spark and didn’t have it.’

As a result, Syracuse’s season ends far too soon. Thursday night at EnergySolutions Arena in the West Regional semifinals in Salt Lake City, the No. 1 seed Orange was blindsided by No. 5 Butler, 63-59. A suffocating defense and late-game rally extinguished Syracuse’s season before any players expected.

‘We were behind the whole game,’ Boeheim said. ‘We were fighting to get back to even the whole game. We never had any opportunity to blow the game open.’

True, but one five-minute span may forever haunt this team.

Another great escape seemed in order after a Kris Joseph dunk gave Syracuse a 54-50 lead with 5:23 to go. All season, Syracuse found a back door to a win. Grit and resolve took over.

But tonight, the opponent punched back. Butler called a timeout, settled down and crushed Syracuse’s dreams.

In front of his own bench, Ronald Nored — a 17 percent 3-point shooter on the season — drained a 3. Syracuse missed, throwback forward Matt Howard powered in a shot to give Butler the lead and Andy Rautins turned the ball over to Butler.

Then, the basketball gods stepped in. Butler guard Willie Veasley heaved a 3-pointer that pinballed high into the sky and somehow whistled through the nylon. Rautins missed a trey on the other end. And with 59 seconds to go, Veasley tipped in an offensive rebound.

Tack on another free throw and cue the blank dazes. With one 11-0 run, Butler sent Syracuse home prematurely.

‘I mean, we came down and made two turnovers in a three-minute span,’ Rautins said. ‘When it came down to it, they executed.’

A week ago, players pegged this a Final Four-or-bust season. No wonder the locker room felt like a funeral.

On a chair, with an ice bag on his left knee, Kris Joseph was speechless. Literally. A pack of reporters approached him and departed within seconds. To Joseph’s left was Scoop Jardine. Sitting next to his dad, Jardine was still numb, still searching for an explanation.

And between the two was Arinze Onuaku. The 261-pound frame that nobody in the NCAA Tournament was ever forced to absorb was slumped in a locker. With a towel draped down from the upper shelf — blocking Onuaku’s face — he wiped away tears.

Of course, things would’ve probably been different with Onuaku manning the paint. Butler’s defense effectively chopped SU’s offense to the half court. Syracuse’s guards couldn’t race into the open court. With disciplined, cautious ball-handlers, the Bulldogs intentionally set the game back decades.

The 25 points Syracuse scored in the first half was its lowest total of the season.

And with the game on the line, Butler erased Wes Johnson. The future lottery pick that so freely fired away a mix of 3-pointers and pull-ups against Gonzaga was shut down in the clutch. During those fatal five minutes, Johnson had zero field-goal attempts, finishing with 17 points on the day. Butler set a Novocaine-numbing tempo from start to finish.

‘They’re a team that takes their time and tries to rock you to sleep,’ Jackson said. ‘They move the ball and play great team basketball.’

For the seniors, this was it. The loss carries an extra sting to Onuaku. He never had his say. Sidelined all Tournament with a quad injury, Onuaku was relegated to unpaid assistant coach. Most of the Syracuse players left Onuaku alone in the locker room. But at one point, Jardine sauntered over.

He lifted the towel up and grabbed Onuaku around the neck. There’s nothing to say. Words will come later.

‘Just held him,’ Jardine said. ‘There’s really nothing you can say to a guy that didn’t even get a chance in his last year. I’ll eventually talk to him later, but I just held him and cried with him because I know how much it hurts him.’

Some underclassmen tried to stay optimistic. They vowed this loss could serve as a learning tool. At heart, they know such talk is forced.

For Butler, this was a program-defining win. When the horn blared, coaches bear-hugged each other and players slapped the hands of fans on their way through the tunnel.

For Syracuse, this was a cruel end to a storybook season. Gripping a towel with both hands, Jackson continued to fight back tears.

This hurts. He’s not sure for how long.

‘It might be nice for some teams to get here and they’re happy about it,’ Jackson said, ‘but for us it’s not enough. It’s not enough.’

thdunne@syr.edu

Published on March 24, 2010 at 12:00 pm