NCAA Basketball: Most exciting under the radar seasons of 2019-20

Syracuse was 14 points away from five additional wins

Syracuse Basketball ended ACC play with a 10-10 record that saw them settle into sixth place. They managed an 18 point win over North Carolina in the ACC tournament prior to the NCAA pulling the plug on the season. While the end of the season was confusing, and worrisome, a lot of things happened in 2019-20 that gave Otto’s Army plenty to cheer about.

Due to how competitive the ACC is, Syracuse did not garner a lot of attention. Coming into the season everybody knew coach Boeheim was going to run his zone defense to limit possessions by encouraging teams to pass while looking for a way to get the ball in the middle.  While their average pace of play was 68 possessions, there were just four teams who played slower in the ACC.

The excitement began before December hit as they dropped 89 on Seattle and 97 on Bucknell, they tallied 97 points on Dec. 7 versus Georgia Tech just to prove it was not a fluke. Scoring a bunch is fun, but nothing creates excitement like a close game and Syracuse had plenty of those.

On Jan. 4 Joseph Girard III made a three-pointer to pull the Orange within one with just one second remaining, which made the game closer than it was. The rematch 18 days later, however, did not disappoint when Notre Dame made a floater to lose by two.

Clemson would beat the Orange by one with a  Clyde Trapp lay-up with two seconds remaining on Jan.28. In February Syracuse played Wake Forest, North Carolina State, and Florida State within a week, and each game was decided by five points or less. The Orange may have only beaten Wake Forest, but Elijah Hughes, who led the ACC in points per game missed a three-pointer to put it into overtime with three seconds left.

Overall, Syracuse had nine games decided by less than five points and three games decided by less than ten. When you consider they had the conference’s most prolific scorer as well as Buddy Boeheim who connected on the most three-pointers in conference play. It is a good thing the two overtime games were on the road, for the Carrier Dome might not have been able to contain the excitement.