Syracuse women’s basketball vs. Florida State: TV/streaming, time, history & more

Teams: Syracuse Orange (20-7, 9-5) vs. Florida State Seminoles (21-6, 9-5)

Date & Time: Thursday, February 28 at 7 p.m. ET

Location: Donald L. Tucker Civic Center, Tallahassee, Fla.

TV/Streaming: ACC Network Extra/WatchESPN

Radio: Cuse.com

FSU Blog: Tomahawk Nation

Series Record: Florida State leads 3-2

Last meeting: Syracuse 76, Florida State 69

The Orange’s 76-69 victory over Florida State was the program’s first win over a top-15 team since 2016. Miranda Drummond had a career-high 38 points, on 14-of-20 shooting from the field. She was on fire from three-point range, hitting 8 of her 13 attempts from deep. She was the only Syracuse player to score in double-digits.

Syracuse took a 34-33 lead into halftime. Drummond led all scorers with 18. Both teams were neck-and-neck and were almost even in all statistical categories. The Seminoles had a 25-18 edge on the boards, but they were only 4-of-10 from the free throw line, while SU was 5-of-6.

After a three-pointer by Isis Young, Syracuse took a 55-53 lead with 9:04 left on the clock. Drummond made back-to-back three pointers to give SU a 69-60 lead with 1:50 left in the game. The lead was too much for Florida State to overcome. Drummond’s career-night led Syracuse to win number 14 on the season.

Head Coaches: SU: Quentin Hillsman (13th season, 283-143); Sue Semrau (22nd season, 426-246)

Coach’s Bio: Semrau is the all time winningest coach in FSU history. She led the Seminoles to 14 NCAA tournament appearances, including 13 of the last 14 seasons. In her time in Tallahassee, Semrau has lead FSU to three Elite Eight appearances and five trips to the Sweet 16.

Florida State has averaged 25 person over the past 10 seasons under Semrau. She has had 31 student-athletes earn academic all-conference honors and 15 players sign professional contracts in the WNBA or with a European Club team.

Semrau is a four time ACC Coach of the Year (2001, 2005, 2009, 2015) and the 2015 Associated Press, WBCA, and ESPNW National Coach of the Year. She was the President of the Women’s Basketball Coach’s Association from 2013-2015.

Last season: The Seminoles were 26-7 and finished third in the conference behind Louisville and Notre Dame. FSU lost to eventually national champion Notre Dame in the semifinals of the ACC tournament. After entering the NCAA tournament as number three seed, the Seminoles easily took care of Arkansas-Little Rock. The next game Florida State was upset on its home floor in the second round by 11 seed Buffalo.

FSU averaged 81 points per game last season, which is second most in program history.

The 2018 senior class was the winningest class in school history with 111 wins. The Seminoles also had multiple players earn All-American honors for the fourth consecutive year. Those players were Shakayla Thomas and Imani Wright, earned first-team ACC honors as well.

Last game: Miami 64, Florida State 54

This was a close game, but neither team shot the ball well. Florida State shot 33 percent from the field and Miami only shot 40 percent. Some areas where Miami had a clear advantage were free throws, points in the paint, second chances points, and points off turnovers.

Other than that, both teams had similar statistical performances. Those four areas are really were the game was won for the Hurricanes. That was a big loss for the Seminoles in terms of ACC standings, because Miami is currently fourth in the conference and Florida State is fifth. With a win, each team would have been 10-4 in ACC conference play. Now Miami has a two game lead on Florida State and the Hurricanes are focused on trying to catch Louisville or NC State of the second or third spot in the conference.

“Fear Me, I’ve Killed Hundreds of Timelords”: Kiah Gillespie averages 16.5 points and 8.9 rebounds per game. That’s a near double-double and she is a problem in the paint.

This is Gillespie’s first full-season with Florida State. The redshirt junior sat out a year, after transferring from Maryland. In her first year playing with the team she is leading the team in both points and rebounds. She is sure to earn All-ACC honors for her play this season.

If Syracuse Wins: They will prove they can bounce back from adversity and earn a win that they need headed into the last two games of the regular season. SU would like to head go into the ACC with a little momentum and wins on the road versus a ranked Florida State team and Boston College would help the cause.

If Syracuse loses: It will look like they can’t win games versus quality opponents like they were at the beginning of the season. This sounds silly because SU beat a few ranked teams earlier on in the season, and gave #3 Oregon all they could handle on the road and only loss by four on the road versus a Minnesota team who was ranked #12 at the time. A loss would not be good for the team’s confidence headed into the post season.