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The Syracuse Orange men’s basketball team rebounded with an 83-57 win over the Miami Hurricanes to end a two-game skid. Led by Joe Girard and Buddy Boeheim — who scored 23 points a piece — Syracuse shot 10-25 from distance and limited Miami to 4-25 from outside.
The Orange improved to 8-4 overall and 2-3 in ACC play. To the takeaways.
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Kadary Richmond and Jesse Edwards deserve more minutes
Off the bench, Richmond dished out eight assists and was stellar yet again defensively. He sparked a 25-3 run in the first half when the Orange were trailing 11-2 to start. He is one of the best playmakers on this team, he just looks at home when he has the ball in his hands. When you surround him with weapons that are lethal from the perimeter, he will create open shots. Overall the team shot 39% from behind the arc and before subbing into the game, no one was finding open looks until he stepped into the game. As for Jesse Edwards, he grabbed 6 boards and scored 7 points in limited minutes. Boeheim hasn’t played him much all season; however, it was clear that he was having an impact in the interior. Moving forward, these two deserve more minutes.
Joe Girard should play off-ball more
Joe Girard was unconscious from downtown tonight. Most of those shots were from catch and shoot opportunities. Yeah, I get it, Girard is a point guard so having in the ball in his hands is key. But, we can’t ignore the fact that he is an elite catch and shoot player. With a player like Richmond or even at times Guerrier passing the ball out of the post, Girard can cause havoc for defenses just solely off of his catch and shoot ability. Chasing him for a full 40 minutes game would be annoying. Keep in mind that he’s shooting 34% from behind the arc despite battling all the COVID pauses throughout the season.
Forcing Miami to make someone else other than Isaiah Wong to score the ball was key
The Hurricanes were fresh off of a win against Louisville and a big part of that was because of Isaiah Wong. He scored 30 points in the matchup and at times it just seemed like he was unstoppable. Knowing Jim Boeheim, you just know he was stressing this to the squad before this game. The zone was a big help with that too. It had to be anyone else but Wong and that was shown in the first half. He was held to only one point and didn’t even score a field goal. Mind you, he is the primary option on the team. In the second half he scored 15 points, but it was all a little too late as the Orange built their lead to 20+ five minutes into the half.