The Orange will always find a way to take a year off your life, win or lose.
Admit it, you thought for a moment there that the Syracuse Orange were going to cruise to victory easily, didn't you?
When will you learn?
How Not To Close Out Basketball Games: A novel by the 2014-15 Syracuse Orange
— Michael Burke (@michaelburke47) January 21, 2015
The Orange controlled about 30 minutes of the game rather easily. In the rest of that time, they let the Boston College Eagles go on a couple runs and stick around late before finally putting them and the SU fanbase out of their misery with a 69-61 victory.
We've been waiting to see what the team would look like if it had to deal with a Rakeem Christmas in early foul trouble and I suppose this was the game to have it happen. Christmas earned his fourth foul early and we got a chance to see Chinonso Obokoh step up. He did...just fine. Good to see.
Michael Gbinije led the Orange in both scoring (17 points) and rebounds (8), making up for Christmas's prolonged absence. Rak still figured out a way to score 12 points and grab seven boards. He eventually fouled out for only the third time this year, but he managed to get his double-digit scoring. Trevor Cooney added fifteen while Kaleb Joseph had thirteen.
The Orange were almost done in by foul shooting (8-of-16 in final two minutes) but thankfully there wasn't enough time left on the clock for BC to get all the way back.
We'll have a broader recap later but leave your immediate reactions below.