Six hundred and ninety-three days: That’s how long it’d been since Syracuse had won a regular season Atlantic Coast Conference game, a number and thought that head coach Ian McIntyre avoided this past week in practice.

“That won’t help, will it?” He said on Wednesday of reminding his players of last year’s winless conference set. “That’d be a pretty stinky rallying call.”

SU scheduled a two-game, west-coast road trip to begin its season that included nationally-ranked Portland to prepare itself for the challenges of an ACC schedule, wary of the struggles it’d endured last year. It emerged out of the trip with a win and a loss and defeated a relentless Hofstra team that almost matched every goal the Orange scored last Friday to up its record to 2-1.

Syracuse had to just beat No. 12 Notre Dame and break its nearly two-year-long conference drought.

But it wasn’t ready.

After a first half where SU (2-2, 0-1 Atlantic Coast) controlled the ball for most of the 45 minutes and put more shots on goal than the Irish, the flip switched. Notre Dame (3-0-1, 1-0) was aggressive early and often, eventually scoring seven minutes into the second half. Seven minutes later, it added another. Syracuse’s offense finally came alive late in the half, but the lead proved insurmountable. The Irish escaped with a 3-2 victory, extending SU’s winless streak.

“We created a lot of chances in the first half,” Jonathan Hagman said. “(Scoring first) is very important, especially when, like we were today, you’re the dominant team.”

That dominance was put on display early in the first half when the Orange put a couple of balls around the net, earning applause from the crowd for its efforts. Even when Notre Dame earned possession, it was in its own half.

One of the first opportunities came from UAB transfer Massimo Ferrin just over 11 minutes into the contest. After finding an open area near the top of the box his teammates found him for what looked like a good chance to score. But his righty kick sailed far over the goal, landing past the fence onto East Colvin Street.

“First game of the season ACC, you’re excited, working to get those three points,” Ferrin said. “Everybody’s got some extra jump in the first game. Unfortunately, it didn’t go well for us tonight.”

After a slick kick save by Orange goalie Hendrik Hilpert, the ball was deflected towards midfield. Hugo Delhommelle looped it forward, seemingly too far in front of Jonathan Hagman before the senior managed to bring it in and challenge the Irish with another good scoring opportunity. But it was stopped.

After a couple of scares, SU took control again of the ball, nearly for the remainder of the half. Possession didn’t equate to scoring though, and the game was scoreless at the break.

“We just didn’t convert, I had two or three chances,” Hagman said. “But you have to leave that behind.”

In the second half, the ball control flipped. After an early attempt by Ryan Raposo was wide left and fell into the side of the net, the Irish took over. First, a questionable foul was called on Kamal Miller in front of the box, but the free kick was off target. Then another foul on Miller a minute later when he appeared to be pulled down. The second free kick was too high but got the Irish a corner kick.

And Notre Dame converted.

The Orange didn’t halt its aggressiveness, even earning its best chance of the night to that point when Raposo found Severin Soerlie for a header that missed just wide left. A failure by Syracuse to clear a free kick by the Irish gave Notre Dame a second chance, and with 31 minutes to go, it added its second goal.

“The second half, they stopped trying to play and they went direct,” McIntyre said. “The problem is, when a team goes direct, if you give up a foul, now they march players down and put balls in the box.”

But Syracuse still wasn’t done. SU was fouled in the penalty box nearly midway through the second half, giving Ferrin a chance to score his first goal in Orange. The transfer didn’t disappoint, cutting the Irish lead in half.

With 15 minutes left, the Irish scored to take its second two-goal lead of the game. Syracuse appeared deflated initially but continued to fight. Norheim brought the crowd alive with his first goal of the season with just under seven minutes to go, and the deficit was back to one.

But it was too little, too late. After an aggressive but scoreless first half, the Orange could never put together consecutive goals to even with the Irish. The winless conference drought increased to 694 days.

Published on September 7, 2018 at 9:15 pm

Contact Eric: erblack@syr.edu | @esblack34