When Derek Maltz and his Syracuse teammates saw their matchup with Duke flash onto the NCAA tournament bracket during the selection show Sunday, they immediately thought back to April 1.
Though the Orange lost to the then-No. 8 Blue Devils 12-10 that day, it finally battled an opponent for an entire game. The week before, Syracuse turned in a lackluster performance against Villanova, and eight days before that, SU was outhustled by a superior Johns Hopkins team.
But against Duke, Maltz and his teammates finally came to play for the full 60 minutes. That game serves as proof of Syracuse’s potential to compete with the nation’s elite.
‘That game was a big part of our season because we came out, we fought really hard, we showed a lot of big teams that we can compete,’ Maltz said.
Now, Syracuse (9-7) gets another chance to prove itself and take down the Blue Devils (13-4) in the first round of the NCAA tournament. The Orange will square off with No. 3 seed Duke at Koskinen Stadium in Durham, N.C., Saturday at noon.
Since taking on the Blue Devils in April, Syracuse has endured an up-and-down finish to its season. At times, like in a 10-8 loss to Georgetown on Senior Day, the team underachieved as it did early in the season. But at others, like in winning the Big East tournament last weekend to earn an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament, SU looked like a force to be reckoned with in postseason play.
After a tough regular season that left the Orange in a must-win situation heading into the conference tournament, SU is peaking at the perfect time as it prepares for its first-round matchup with the Blue Devils.
‘Pretty much, the slate has been wiped clean,’ SU head coach John Desko said. ‘Although we look back and from the second half of the Notre Dame game until now, I think we’ve played very good lacrosse.’
Desko said his team today is far and away better than the one that lost to Duke on April 1.
Then, Syracuse had a bevy of holes to fill. Holes in nearly every aspect of the game -from goaltending to the defensive unit to offensive production to faceoffs, extra-man opportunities and ground balls – hurt the Orange at some point this season.
But Monday, Desko could list every area as a strength following a dominant performance by his team at the Big East tournament last weekend. The Orange blew away the competition, defeating Villanova 15-6 and St. John’s 12-4.
And now the team heads to Durham ready to challenge Duke for a second time.
‘You can see the team’s confidence is through the roof,’ SU defender Brian Megill said. ‘But you got to be confident, but you got to stay composed, and you got to stay hungry because when you get confident, sometimes you tend to get lackadaisical.’
‘We got to keep that fight, we got to keep that hunger and we got to keep playing a full 60 minutes of lacrosse with everything we got,’ Megill added.
For Megill and Syracuse, the first sign of its ability to fight for the full 60 minutes came against the Blue Devils on April 1.
Since then, the Orange has slowly developed into a complete team. And as Desko said, this group is a different, better version of the one Duke faced in the first matchup.
Tim Desko said the team has finally started to do the little things that win games, like winning faceoffs and picking up ground balls. Maltz, Marasco and John Desko all praised faceoff specialists Ricky Buhr and Chris Daddio for their improvements at the X. And Bobby Wardwell has settled into his role in between the pipes.
With SU clicking on all cylinders, the Orange doesn’t feel like a team that snuck into the NCAA tournament. After tearing through its competition last weekend, Maltz and his teammates feel like they can play with anyone in the country again.
‘I think a lot of teams are pretty nervous come May that they’re going to have to play Syracuse,’ Maltz said. ‘I can’t imagine Duke is really happy after being a three seed and having to play us, so we’re just really excited and can’t wait for it.’
rjgery@syr.edu