Gerry McNamara doesn’t like to think of himself as solely a shooter.

At the beginning of the season, he cringed when constantly questioned about his 3-point shot. Despite hours of shooting practice, the self-professed gym rat insisted he brought more than an accurate outside shot.

During a 76-69 victory over No. 11 Missouri last night in front of 18,756 at the Carrier Dome, McNamara showcased his overall game and Syracuse showed off a well-balanced attack as all of its starters scored in double-figures.

McNamara finished with seven assists and four steals to go along with 14 points.

‘Sometimes, we’re spoiled by him,” Syracuse head coach Jim Boeheim said. “He plays like a senior, and we expect him to play like a grad student. He’s not perfect. By next week, he probably will be.’

Leading by 13 points with 11 minutes left, the No. 25 Orangemen (11-1) dozed off, allowing the Tigers (10-2) a 9-0 run in a three-minute span. That forced Boeheim to expend a timeout and question whether his team was too tired to weather the explosion.

After the timeout, McNamara took over.

He got Syracuse off the schneid, burying a 3-pointer. On the following possession, he whistled a no-look pass to Hakim Warrick, who was fouled attempting a dunk. After Warrick made a free throw, McNamara buried a second 3-pointer, prompting freshman Carmelo Anthony to drape himself on McNamara’s shoulders.

‘We know McNamara’s a good player,’ Missouri coach Quin Snyder said. ‘He showed a lot of poise out there tonight.’

Despite his late sharpshooting, McNamara’s normal accuracy was missing in the first half. Although he scored eight of his 14 points in the first 20 minutes, McNamara missed all four of his 3-point attempts over that span.

Even so, McNamara understands he’ll always be tagged a shooter.

‘In the first half, they just weren’t going in,’ McNamara said. ‘They felt good leaving my hand, but they weren’t falling. The coaches told me to keep shooting. Shooters shoot.’

McNamara’s teammates more than made up for his early inability to hit.

All five Syracuse starters finished in double figures for the first time this season. In four games against major-conference opponents, Syracuse finished with more than three players in double figures just once.

Missouri was led by point guard Ricky Clemons, who totaled 26 points. Only two other Tigers, Arthur Johnson (17 points) and Rickey Paulding (11), managed double digits.

‘You have to have balance to play good basketball,’ Boeheim said. ‘We said earlier when Carmelo had 37 and nobody else had double figures that that wasn’t good. He’s going to have bad nights.’

In Syracuse’s lone loss, to Memphis, Anthony scored 27 points, but only he and McNamara scored more than 10.

The Tigers used a series of double-teams to hold Anthony, the Big East’s leading scorer, to 16 points, his lowest total. Unfortunately for the Tigers, the strategy backfired, leaving SU’s other scorers free.

‘We knew they had a bunch of weapons,’ Clemons said. ‘They showed that tonight. We wanted to contain Anthony and double him up sometimes. We did a good job doing that. But everybody else got going.’

In the first half, Warrick got going. He kept the Orangemen in the game, scoring 12 points on 6-of-10 shooting.

‘Sometime in the first half, I heard their coach yelling, ‘You can’t leave Warrick alone anymore,’ ‘ Warrick said. ‘We just kept having other guys fill in and make shots.’

Even Syracuse’s centers, the position of most concern to Boeheim during the season’s first few weeks, took part in the offensive explosion. Craig Forth, who finished with 11 points, began the game with a wide-open dunk after Missouri doubled Anthony.

Forth, booed often by students at the season’s start, left to a standing ovation after starting the second half with a pair of layups and a baseline jumper.

‘This was a statement game,’ Anthony said. ‘This was a top-15 team, and we wanted to prove that we belong in the Top 25. That’s how we came out and played.’

Published on January 13, 2003 at 12:00 pm