It's The Syracuse Orange vs. The Georgetown Hoyas. What else do you need to know?
I'll tell you what you need to know...what's going on in the mind of a deranged Georgetown fan? How do they tick? What dark liquids do they ingest to keep their black hearts pumping?
The Casual Hoya Editorial Staff broke party lines and answered a couple questions that we sent his way. Below are answers. Reading them will not cause blindness or hereditary balding, I promise.
Check out answers from myself and Glaude over at Casual Hoya.
Tens of thousands of Syracuse fans are going to read this post today. You only get once chance to make a first impression. Make your opening statement.
HAHAHHAHAHAHAHA. HAHAHAHAHAHAH. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAH
Georgetown can't come party with Syracuse in the ACC. (There's a membership restriction relating to boat shoes and cardigans for the tennis club: You can't own these things to join the confederation). So, which tire fire does Georgetown throw itself on: Some bastardized Big East? Colonial Athletic? Put boards on the windows, talk about the great run you had, and wait for a government bailout? Give me your best, worst, and most likely "my-body-is-covered-in-80%-burns" scenarios.
This is awkward since the memo was likely lost somewhere on the ice trail from the nearest airport to the Syracuse Athletic Department, but have you seen how Duke and UNC fans dress? Anyway, conference realignment sucks. It sucks for Georgetown, it sucks for the Big East, and it sucks for fans of college basketball.
Best Scenario: the Big East survives as an island of misfit toys and good BBQ (hello, Memphis!) and lands a great TV contract on the re-launched NBC Sports (death to ESPN). Georgetown supports 29 sports with the revenues from its basketball program and it needs all the money it can get.
Worst Scenario: Georgetown gives up on basketball - which is unlikely given Paul Tagliabue, Ted Leonsis, and Alonzo Mourning all sit on the Georgetown Board of Directors. They know the importance and value of athletics to the University (I hope).
Most Likely: No idea, seriously. Conference destruction is far from over and there are so many moving pieces to keep track of. When will SEC, Big 12, and Pac-12 teams withdraw from NCAA? When will carriers/consumers realize that the majority of content on The Longhorn Network (and others like it) is high school tennis and refuse to pay the ridiculous transmission fees currently being demanded? When will Syracuse turn into BC? I think Georgetown will just have to be ready to react and the only thing it should be doing now is shoring up support between the best non-football playing schools in the top TV markets.
Name 'em: Top-three Syracuse-Georgetown games you've ever seen. (Any game that involves Manley Field House will result in punch-o-grams.)
Since I’m in a joyous mood today I’ll spare you the indignity of recalling the 70s and 80s where Georgetown owned Syracuse and focus on a few more recent games.
January 25, 1996: Georgetown 83, Syracuse 64.
The Iverson-led Hoyas drubbed the John Wallace-led OrangeMEN at USAir Arena in Landover, Md. This game is memorable for me for a couple of reasons, the first being that it was my freshman year and those Hoyas were epic, but second because towards the end of the game in the blowout, a Syracuse point guard by the name of Donovan McNabb took the court to a smattering of boos and promptly went 0-3 from the floor, showing off hints of the accuracy he would later exhibit as an NFL quarterback.
2010 Big East Tournament: Georgetown 91, Syracuse 84.
This one was nice. The Hoyas dropped 54 points against your precious Zone in the 2nd half as the 22nd ranked Hoyas sent your 3rd ranked (and #1 seeded in the BET) ass packing. Georgetown’s play in that run through the BET, eventually losing to West Virginia on a horrifyingly Ray Allen-esque shot by Da’Sean Butler, fed the collective delusion of the Hoya fanbase leading many to believe that Georgetown could win the whole shebang in the NCAA Tournament. That team had tremendous upside, and when it was on, could dominate anyone, as evidenced by our dismantling of both National Title participants (Duke and Butler) that season.
Alas, there were two negatives to come of the Syracuse-Georgetown 2010 BET battle. One, we lost to Ohio in the first round of the NCAA Tournament a week later. Two, Syracuse's Arinze Onuaku ended his collegiate career, effectively hampering Syracuse's season. As we saw with Chris Wright last year, no matter how deep the rivalry, you never want to see someone's career end like that.
2011 Regular Season: Georgetown and Syracuse Split Season Series
Both of these games were awesome and great representations of the rivalry. The first game at the Carrier Dome where the 11th ranked Hoyas beat the Orange was JT3’s first win at the Carrier Dome and was as satisfying a win as any in recent memory. The second game was a loss for the Hoyas, but with Chris Wright sidelined the team showed a lot of heart in front of a boisterous Verizon crowd. The Hoyas clawed back from a big deficit to briefly take the lead in the 2nd half only to falter down the stretch. Importantly, that game gave Markel Starks his first real taste of meaningful minutes in the rivalry, something that should help him as he takes the court as floor general tonight.
Syracuse and Georgetown aren't going to play anymore, right? Is this the end of the league's best rivalry? This stinks. Discuss your feelings.
You nailed it. It stinks. Officials from both schools are saying that the rivalry will continue but we all know this is going to be like a long divorce. An out of conference match-up between Georgetown and Syracuse in December doesn't have the same appeal as a battle in February or March. At the end of the day, Syracuse will need to concentrate on building rivalries with new friends at N.C. State and Wake Forest (HA) and Georgetown will focus on Villanova, St. John's, UConn and Marquette. All this because Syracuse wanted a better match for its women's Olympic sports. Thanks, dummies.
Nice job at international relations, dummies. You know China is full of really pissed off people, right? You saw the opening ceremonies to the 2008 Olympics, right? That's not a fuse that should be set, knuckleheads.
Did you see those opening ceremonies? They were magical! Over at THE GLOBAL PHENOMENON we appreciate pageantry and spectacle, and nothing evokes splendor like an old fashioned brawl with communists. But listen dudes, unlike at Syracuse where you apparently are willing to fork over years of basketball tradition to be able to play Georgia Tech in field hockey, the focus on our playground is basketball, and Georgetown’s on-court experience over there has helped immensely this season. You think some ogre with questionable academic standing like Fab Melo is going to intimidate Henry Sims when he has already faced the Chinese military team in hand-to-hand combat? Be afraid, fruity ones. Be very afraid.
If Georgetown is going to beat Syracuse this week, what needs to happen? (Excluding the possibility of Jim Boeheim having a coronary on the court.)
Email me the address of your mom’s basement so I can send you the tape from last season’s game at the Carrier Dome. If you recall, Georgetown was deftly able to neutralize Syracuse’s vaunted 2-3 Zone by putting point guard Chris Wright at the top of the key and letting him make the decisions with the ball. The good news for Cuse is that Wright is no longer at Georgetown. The bad news is that you’re likely to see a heavy dose of Henry Sims and Otto Porter up there, whose length and play-making ability make Chris Wright look like Rakeem Christmas.
Too soon?
Assuming the Big East basketball exists after Syracuse and Georgetown pummel each other creating a rip in the space time continuum due to the level of sheer disdain put on display, how does the rest of the season shake out? Syracuse and Georgetown finish 1-2? Who else is in double-bye territory?
Syracuse actually has a pretty brutal stretch coming up, although it appears that UConn has packed it in for the season and will spend the rest of February and March collectively pooping their diapers. Regardless, it will end up being Syracuse, Georgetown, Marquette, Louisville methinks. I don't see how Notre Dame continues to do what it has done, mostly because I hate Mike Brey and his mock turtlenecks. In addition, Jack Cooley looks a lot like Buzz from Home Alone, and his girlfriend was gross.
Banana Republic or Vineyard Vines?
As my good friend Fergie once said "I'm so three thousand and eight, you're so two thousand and late". It's all about Bonobos pants now. Banana Republic is owned by The Gap, and The Gap is for poor people.
I'm in D.C. and I have one last meal to eat (because I'm going to be violently murdered (I am, after all, in D.C. and D.C. is really good at that). Where am I eating and what's on my plate?
The new quintessential strictly DC food is anything with mumbo sauce. Best described as a cross between bbq sauce and sweet and sour, it's essentially Type 2 Diabetes in one serving (Paula Deen approved!) that you put on any sort of fried food you can imagine. It's available from any number of Yum's (this one even goes so far as to call it "mumble" sauce: http://www.beyondmenu.com/20499/Washington-DC/Yum-s-Carryout-Washington-20002.aspx?r=20499) throughout the city and even the Phone Booth has bought into the craze and now offers "Chinatown" sauce on your wings.
Florida Avenue Grill (http://floridaavenuegrill.com/) still keeps it real casual and has an absurd collection of signed photos on the wall (Mario Barry, Janet Reno, and a Wesley Snipes 'The Fan' promo shot a small sampling). It's not healthy or light but they serve a tremendous half smoke and the breakfast is sufficiently greasy to set things straight after a rough night.
Oh and if you're looking for something highbrow (which I assume as a Cuse alum you aren’t), follow the advice of Shit DC Says and search out a Jose Andres place (http://youtu.be/FuPwy77scvw)
Seriously, I hate you guys.
If you hate us now, just wait until the final buzzer tonight.