Syracuse Basketball has had an up-and down season, and the three-point line has been the biggest reason why.
Syracuse Basketball came to into the season ranked 16th in the AP Poll and returned a lot from a team that made the sweet sixteen last season as an 11-seed. The Orange (13-5), have had an up-and-down season which has included back-to-back neutral site losses to Connecticut and Oregon and back-to-back home losses to Old Dominion and Buffalo.
But Jim Boeheim’s squad has had some really impressive games as well, most notably road wins over Ohio State and Duke. The eye-test says the Orange are very talented and consequently have a high upside. Tyus Battle, Frank Howard, Oshae Brissett, and Elijah Hughes have all flashed high-level offensive abilities.
Per usual, Syracuse has been good on the defensive end (currently 13th in country per KenPom). But despite the “eye-test talent” the Orange have on offense, it’s this side of the ball that’s been holding the team back. In the three losses Syracuse has suffered since mid-November, its defense has only given up 1.03 points per possession defensively. Essentially, their opposition only scored at the 138th best rate in the country per NCAA.com, yet still beat the Orange every time.
Old Dominion: L 68-62 (67 poss.) Buffalo: L 71-59 (69 poss.)
Georgia Tech: L 73-59 (70 poss.)
(All statistics used in this article were found via KenPom and NCAA.com and are up to date through the games completed on Jan 19.).
Although Syracuse hasn’t excelled at areas like offensive rebounding, limiting turnovers, and free throw shooting, none of these are the main area that has been holding the offense back: 3-point shooting. Not only are the Orange only making 31.4% of their 3’s (282nd in country), 42.0% of their shot attempts have been threes (99th in country). Essentially, Syracuse has been shooting a lot of threes and shooting them poorly…not a good combination.
136 teams in the country are are attempting at least 40% of shots from three, and only 12 have a worse 3-point percentage than the Orange. The team hasn’t been shooting well all season, but Syracuse’s worst losses have, perhaps unsurprisingly, came when they’ve shot the worst (see Oregon, Georgia Tech). But in the three games the Orange have shot at a 40-plus percent rate, (see Ohio St, Notre Dame, Duke) they’ve arguably looked like a top 10-15 team. Will the Duke victory be a turning point in the team’s shooting?
One more thing on Syracuse…only a few teams in the country have allowed more 3-point attempts (348th nationally). Along with how the Orange themselves shoot the three, the long-range shooting of their opponents will arguably be just as important in determining the team’s fate. In this sense, Duke was actually an okay matchup for Syracuse, as the Blue Devils have only made 31.8% of their threes (268th nationally).
Obviously, offensive and defensive three-point percentages are important in determining the outcomes of any game. But there are few teams in the country with a higher variance than the Orange (i.e. 73-59 Home L to GA Tech followed by a 95-91 road win at Duke). And maybe more than any team in the country, this variance has been driven by the 3-point line. If the team starts consistently shooting better, look out.