Every year it’s discussed and every year Syracuse head coach Jim Boeheim shrugs it off – SU’s non-conference schedule is too easy. Critics say the Orange plays too many soft upstate-New York teams at the Carrier Dome before Jan. 1.

This year, that has been far from true, though. The Orange has played three ranked teams away from the Dome and has handled itself very well. On paper, Syracuse’s 74-60 loss to Oklahoma State on Tuesday night looks devastating, but it should help the Orange gauge its performance as it prepares for a difficult Big East schedule.SU will continue its preparation at the Dome on Saturday night at 7 against Binghamton.

After SU’s 91-67 win over St. Bonaventure on Dec. 1, Boeheim said his opponents’ geographic location never makes a difference.

‘When North Carolina plays teams in the state, they don’t say they’re playing only in North Carolina,’ he said. ‘What does it matter where they’re from?’

Four of the Orange’s seven wins have come against New York opponents at the Dome. It has played three games against ranked teams at a neutral site – Madison Square Garden – and one non-ranked team in Albany.

Boeheim doesn’t seek out easy opponents to beat up on, he said. Instead, the quality of the opponent is coincidental with its location.

‘I don’t care where they’re from and I don’t keep track of that,’ Boeheim said. ‘It doesn’t matter what you do for five games. It matters what you do over an entire season. We play teams that are closer to us rather than bring somebody in from Nichols State or Savannah State because we’d rather play a team that we know is gonna play us tough.’

It appears SU is over the initial hump of its uncharacteristic schedule. Starting with Binghamton, it has six games at home against unranked opponents before the Big East schedule starts in January. These games should provide SU an opportunity to work out any kinks. Consider the following:

–The Orange is shooting only 52 percent from the free-throw line. Wooden Award candidate Gerry McNamara has already missed seven free throws in eight games. By comparison, he missed only 18 in 31 games last year and only nine in 35 games during his freshman season. Oklahoma State exploited this Tuesday night, as SU shot 32 percent from the stripe.

–In eight starts, Demetris Nichols is averaging only five points and he is only 5-for-22 from 3-point range. If SU has Final Four hopes, it must find another shooter to complement McNamara.

–Billy Edelin is not back to his old self, yet. If Nichols continues to struggle, the experience and scoring ability of Edelin could be a big boost for this team and give McNamara a chance to find open looks.

Orange players echoed that there are some things to work on in the coming weeks.

‘We have to work on defense and switching from zone to man-to-man,’ center Craig Forth said.

‘We gotta work on getting more second-chance points,’ forward Hakim Warrick said. ‘There’s no way we can continue to shoot free throws like this.’

As SU enters phase two, it can be confident knowing that it beat two ranked opponents and hung with another for 34 minutes of basketball. But now, it must improve, starting with Binghamton.

‘It’s not like we lost to a really bad team,’ Forth said. ‘It’s good experience, and we’re gonna have to learn from it and get better.’

Published on December 9, 2004 at 12:00 pm