Syracuse has had nearly two weeks to sort out the causes of four weeks worth of miscues.

The bye week came at a time when the penalties, turnovers and miscues were mounting for the 1-3 Orange. With an extra week to prepare for its Big East opener against Pittsburgh on Friday, Syracuse zoned in on working to limit the mistakes that helped sink the team in each of its three losses.

“During the bye week, we obviously paid more attention to those things — turnovers, penalties, situations during the course of a game which are really hurting,” Marrone said during the Big East coaches’ teleconference on Monday. “Those are things we’ve worked on.”

The head-scratching mistakes are perhaps the biggest culprit for a disappointing start to the season for Marrone and Syracuse. The Orange is seventh in the Big East in turnover margin per game at -1.5. That also puts Syracuse in a tie with three other teams for 109th in the country.

SU’s 35 penalties, which have resulted in 271 lost yards, place the team fifth in the conference in total penalties for the season.

“Turnovers have obviously hurt us. I think that’s the first way you put yourself in jeopardy of losing a game,” Marrone said. “We’ve done that consistently in the four games that we’ve played.”

In Syracuse’s last game against Minnesota on Sept. 22, the Orange racked up 10 penalties for 79 yards and lost two of three fumbles. After the game, quarterback Ryan Nassib said the team “shot ourselves in the foot” with all the turnovers.

Nassib is fifth in the country in passing yards per game with 341.8. Marcus Sales’ 95.5 yards per game put him at 20th in the country.

Syracuse’s new-look, no-huddle offense has often shined, but the mistakes are casting a dark cloud over the team’s ability to reverse the losing trend.

Marrone also said the team worked on its “tight” red-zone offense this week, which has been poor through four games. Tackling has been another issue for SU, and it was a point of emphasis during the bye week.

“Everyone understands that if we can clean those things up — not that it’s going to guarantee us a win — but it’ll give us a much better opportunity,” Marrone said.

Friday night lights

While Friday’s game against Pittsburgh will be in primetime and on national television, Marrone said he hopes his players don’t feel extra motivation simply because of that.

Opening up the conference schedule coming off a loss and needing to turn the season around should be enough to fire the players up. The players shouldn’t need to draw off playing a primetime game to find their motivation, Marrone said.

“As a coach, you hope that’s not the case,” Marrone said. “You hope that, you have a limited amount of opportunities per year in this game, you put a lot of work into it.”

The last time the Orange played on a Friday night was one of the team’s signature wins under Marrone. Syracuse beat West Virginia 49-23 and seemed to have taken a major step. Instead, the team went into a tailspin and lost its final five games of the season.

Still, Marrone has seen what his team can do when it plays well. Too often this season, that hasn’t happened. Trying to find a way to get this team to resemble the one that beat the Mountaineers a year ago is the head coach’s challenge this week.

“The team has worked extremely hard,” Marrone said. “I think they’re focused in the areas that we have to do a better job of.”

Published on October 2, 2012 at 12:11 am

Contact Chris: cjiseman@syr.edu | @chris_iseman