Malachi Richardson had been in the same situation twice before. Less than 10 seconds on the clock while he stood at the foul line in a game Syracuse barely led. Once against Clemson. Once against Duke. One the Orange lost partly because he missed, one the Orange won despite another miss.

This time, the freshman hit both to put SU up three on Georgia Tech. This time, he deflected the halfcourt pass and Syracuse escaped with a win.

On Saturday, Richardson took a while to get going but chipped in 13 points to support Michael Gbinije’s team-high 16. And despite being out-muscled on the interior after Dajuan Coleman fouled out, Syracuse (15-8, 5-5 Atlantic Coast) squeaked out a 60-57 win over Georgia Tech (12-9, 2-6) in the Carrier Dome.

After Syracuse began the game 4-of-16 from the field, the Orange pounded the paint. Richardson 3-pointers were replaced by Richardson flinging the ball inside to Coleman, who chipped in nine first-half points and helped neutralize Georgia Tech forward Charles Mitchell, the conference’s leading rebounder.

SU went with a backcourt of Gbinije, Trevor Cooney and Frank Howard for the latter part of the first half as Richardson sat. Howard sliced into the lane several times and fed Tyler Roberson and Coleman as Syracuse rounded out its 20 first-half points in the paint. The freshman tallied four first-half assists and set the Orange up to score inside the arc when it only hit four shots from outside it.

Both Syracuse buckets in the first 38 seconds of the second frame came at the rim, the first from Gbinije, the second Richardson’s first points of the day on a crafty finish. But Yellow Jackets gunner Adam Smith, who Jim Boeheim has repeatedly stressed could be danger for Syracuse, kept GT within striking distance before putting it ahead with a 3 that rattled around the rim before dropping.

With 12 minutes remaining, the two teams had already equaled the 91 combined points from last season’s 46-45 matchup. But the hectic pace slowed and methodically managed possessions were dragged down further by fouls on the floor. Coleman – who was attached to a significantly longer leash than in games past – picked up a charge and Boeheim smiled on the sideline without the outbursts that accompanied several prior calls.

Georgia Tech missed three point-blank shots at the rim before Lydon finally came down with the ball, leading to a Roberson and-one at the other end to tie the game at 49.

But a game that lived mainly in the paint tipped in Georgia Tech’s favor when Coleman was called for his fifth foul on incidental contact with over six minutes left. At 268 pounds, he was the only body capable of giving Georgia Tech what its bigs were doling out, and a Ben Lammers two-handed dunk and turnaround hook on the 210-pound Lydon immediately followed Coleman’s departure.

Georgia Tech grabbed a handful of offensive rebounds in a row, but it was Syracuse’s two consecutive boards on the offensive glass that kept GT from pulling ahead in a game tied at 55. The Orange couldn’t convert, but it was getting the chances. And finally, at the spot it struggled from (SU had hit 9-of-17 free throws at that point), Gbinije hit two to give Syracuse its first lead in 10 minutes and one that wouldn’t slip away.

Published on January 30, 2016 at 2:09 pm

Contact Matt: mcschnei@syr.edu | @matt_schneidman