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The second-half clock had already wound down to 15 seconds when Jesse Edwards bounced the ball to Jimmy Boeheim across the paint. The Syracuse forward backed his way toward the basket against Florida State’s Caleb Mills, so if his hook shot bounced off, that’d leave the Orange minimal time to reset. Jimmy took one dribble. Then, he turned to his right. And as he rose for his shot, it resembled a type Cole Swider said “he makes 90% of the time.” With Syracuse trailing 72-71 late in the second half, the play that unfolded following Jim Boeheim’s timeout had created the high-percentage scoring look intended. 

But the arc on Jimmy’s shot only carried it to the front of the rim, and the ball ricocheted toward the opposite sideline. RayQuan Evans grabbed possession and threaded a pass to Matthew Cleveland for a transition dunk that put FSU up three. Instead of calling a timeout, Joe Girard III immediately chucked the ball toward half-court, and Evans — still stationed near the SU bench after his outlet pass to Cleveland — corralled the ball with no SU player even in the area to disrupt the steal. Evans promptly strolled down the court and hit the last two free throws that clinched the game.

“I don’t know what (Girard) said. He thought he had somebody open,” Boeheim said, “but he didn’t.”

Swider said postgame that since only seconds remained, the last shot would’ve been a heave — with FSU potentially fouling as it held a three-point lead — and Girard was “just trying to get it up and obviously give us a look.” Instead, it created a chaotic sequence capturing how quickly sparks in SU’s season have been extinguished, how one error like a missed shot quickly compounded into others that eventually spiraled out of control. 

Syracuse now sits with four conference losses on Jan. 15 for the first time since 2018 and just the third time since joining the Atlantic Coast Conference after its 76-71 loss to the Seminoles. FSU connected on 12 of their 20 3s after they made just 4-of-30 when these two teams met a month prior and spoiled Swider’s 3-point resurgence of his own.

“We just weren’t as effective defensively as we need to be,” Boeheim said. “They shot it really well. They made some long 3s, some tough 3s. But we have to defend it better than we did.”

The loss was the Orange’s fourth in the last five games, and all four have been by a combined 14 points with blown leads emerging as a common denominator. They led by double-digit points again on Saturday, but across the final five minutes of the first half and opening eight of the second, Florida State had erased an early 10-point deficit and turned it into a comfortable lead behind a barrage of 3s. The Seminoles hit four of their first five attempts to start the second frame and connected on 60% overall before the Orange made their run inside the final minute.

Syracuse players and coaches were forced to watch as several last-minute errors cost the Orange a chance at a second straight win. Courtesy of Dennis Nett | syracuse.com

It was a stark difference from what unfolded one month ago in Tallahassee when FSU struggled shooting and lost despite being the first team to truly limit Buddy Boeheim’s offensive impact. The Orange turned to Swider, to Girard, to anyone else it could with a short rotation and their leading scorer bottled up, and Swider responded by taking a season-high 15 shots.

This time, Buddy started the game by scoring five points in the first six minutes, but then Swider started to convert. He started with a mid-range jumper from the left elbow, and then, after Buddy missed a 3 and Girard grabbed an offensive rebound, connected from the corner to put the Orange up 14-9. After a 6-2 burst in between the first and second media timeouts, SU positioned itself for a chance to turn a win over Pittsburgh into its first winning streak of the new year.

After Florida State secured an offensive rebound with 5:45 left, the ball eventually worked its way around to Quincy Ballard in the paint. The 7-foot center backed toward the block against Edwards, but he lost his handle and the ball ended up into the hands of Girard, pushing the other way in transition. Ballard fouled him shooting a 3, Girard sank the trio of free throws, and Syracuse’s lead extended to 10.

But once Florida State started to crawl back, its brief flashes proved sustainable — especially when SU’s miscues resurfaced. When Cleveland missed a free throw in the first half, Jimmy couldn’t catch the rebound and Edwards’ momentum took him out of bounds. Edwards turned around to try and throw it back into play, but he instead tossed the ball off Girard, who was also standing out of bounds. FSU scored a late basket after the ensuing inbounds, and Girard turned the ball over on the next possession before committing a foul, too.

The Seminoles scored another 11 points in the first four minutes of the frame to pull ahead. Naheem McLeod was called for an offensive flagrant 1 foul for his contact with Edwards, but Florida State responded by forcing Edwards into his third foul on the next possession. 

The 3s had started to fall for FSU, too. Evans connected for its first deep shot of the second half with 17:45 left, and Mills followed less than a minute later. The Seminoles pulled ahead by as many as seven with 11 minutes left in the frame, but then the Orange started to make their run. They switched to a lineup with three guards — with Girard and Symir Torrence perched at the top of the zone, and Buddy taking over Jimmy’s spot at the bottom — and found more success moving the ball on offense.

Syracuse’s last lead came on an Edwards dunk with 7:33 left, though, and after that, the 3-pointers that’d kept the Seminoles afloat finally pushed them ahead for good. They’d already made 11 of them when Wyatt Wilkes flicked his wrist and No. 12 threatened to serve as the dagger. The shot clock had ticked under 10 seconds with less than three minutes in the second half, but Wilkes had still found a way to operate with open space in the corner.

When it sank through the net, Florida State emerged with a four-point lead that lasted over the final 120 seconds. Then, everything unraveled for the Orange in the final sequence, and it left Boeheim lashing out at the referee from the bench, Carrier Dome fans staring around in disbelief and the latest reminder glowing on the scoreboard that maybe the trajectory of Syracuse’s season — one now destined to land outside of the NCAA Tournament field barring a late-season run, especially after the latest loss that Boeheim called “very disappointing” — isn’t reversible after all.

Published on January 15, 2022 at 5:33 pm

Contact Andrew: arcrane@syr.edu | @CraneAndrew