PROVIDENCE, R.I. – The Syracuse men’s basketball team came here a battered champion Saturday, crown falling off and title belt loosened to its final notch. In two hours, Providence stripped Syracuse of both the crown and belt, leaving them open for any challengers worthy of wearing them.

For now, the Orangemen aren’t.

After Providence – which didn’t even play its best game – blasted the Orangemen out of the Dunkin’ Donuts Center, 74-61, Syracuse cemented its place in the Big East. As of Saturday at about 2 p.m., it’s Connecticut, Pittsburgh, Providence, perhaps Seton Hall, and then everybody else. Syracuse, for the moment at least, can’t claim a spot at the Big East’s head table.

Once Syracuse fell by double-digits at Seton Hall, it had three opportunities to prove it belonged among the conference’s elite – against Pitt, UConn and PC. Instead, Syracuse made repeating last year’s magical run look more and more like fantasy.

Simply losing those games isn’t an indictment of how poorly SU is playing. Plenty of good teams could lose against the Big East’s three ranked teams. But Syracuse barely competed in them, losing by a combined 62 points.

Pittsburgh held Syracuse to its lowest point total, 45, since Jim Boeheim took over as head coach. UConn, which whipped SU, 84-56, a week from today, had never beaten SU so badly. And Providence dispatched of Syracuse despite Ryan Gomes, the Friars’ best player, committing seven turnovers.

‘This was an extraordinarily tough stretch,’ Boeheim said. ‘Looking at it coming in, we thought this would be the toughest part of the season. If we could be 14-5 at this stage, I would have been very happy. I’m not too happy the way we’ve played these games. I think we could have been much better. I wouldn’t have been surprised if we lost this set of games, but we haven’t played at all. And that’s disappointing.’

The Orangemen, now losers of four of five games, are tied with Rutgers for sixth place in the Big East. With their play over the past five games, they’ve offered no reason to believe they can even contend with Pittsburgh or Connecticut when they play again later this year.

Too many things have to go right for SU to win consistently against top-flight competition. For SU to even have a chance, either guards Josh Pace or Billy Edelin or center Craig Forth have to become a viable third-scoring option, and to do that, they must play their absolute best. Asking for a career game out of a player every game isn’t realistic.

It’s almost time to readjust aspirations for Syracuse. After all, you can’t repeat as national champions if you don’t make the NCAA Tournament.

‘If we keep playing how we’re playing,’ Pace said, ‘then we’re not going to win any games.’

Not with its offense playing like it has been, especially. At the beginning of the year, Syracuse struggled with movement in its offense. That seemed to be cured when Syracuse rolled over Notre Dame and Missouri on the road and Michigan State at home. Edelin and Pace drove to the hoop with abandon, setting up single-teams for Hakim Warrick. Fans started punching tickets to the Sweet 16 and beyond.

The trip to Seton Hall changed that. Possibly because of Gerry McNamara’s left groin tweak and Edelin missing two games, Syracuse lost any semblance of flow. To say SU’s offense is stuck in a rut would be an understatement. It’s more like a marble that rolled down the Mariana Trench.

Offensive possessions for Syracuse too often play out as glorified one-on-one sessions, lasting a single pass and a move to the basket. That works against the bevy of Central New York teams SU annually plays because players like Warrick are too athletic for those teams to contain. Against elite competition, which the Orangemen have fallen on their face against, SU needs more diversity.

And it needs to figure out where to find it fast. The schedule doesn’t get too much easier from here. A home date against Notre Dame and a trip to West Virginia will be SU’s easiest games, and neither is a gimme.

‘They have to play a lot better,’ Boeheim said. ‘If we’re capable of it, we’ll find out Tuesday night.’

If they’re not, the reigning kings of college basketball won’t hold that title past March.-

Simply losing these games isn’t an indictment of how poorly SU is playing. Plenty of good teams could lose against the Big East’s three ranked teams. But Syracuse barely competed in them, losing by a combined 62 points.

Published on February 8, 2004 at 12:00 pm