ACC Preview #11 – Syracuse

ACC coaching has gone through massive changes in the last few years and that’s certainly true for Syracuse. Jim Boeheim stepped down in 2023-24 and his assistant and former point guard Adrian Autry took over for his legendary predecessor.

Small bit of trivia: the NCAA vacated 101 of Boeheim’s wins. If he still had those, he would have 1,116 wins to Mike Krzyzewski’s 1,202, or just 86 wins behind his good friend Coach K. Krzyzewski picks up a lot of mileage in NCAA wins of course, where he has 101 wins, and another 65 in ACC Tournament triumphs. K’s winning percentage is also better at .785 to Boeheim’s official .697. It’s interesting that K’s NCAA wins perfectly match the number of vacated wins by Boeheim.

Autry, who was born in Monroe NC but grew up in Harlem, started at point guard for all four years at Syracuse, back in the Big East days.

In his first two seasons, Autry finished 20-12 and then 14-19 last year. His career record so far is 34-31 which is over .500, but barely, and certainly not where Orange fans would like to be.

Syracuse has a lot going for it as a basketball school. First, it’s in an area where there isn’t any professional basketball to compete with.

Toronto is 4 1/2 hours away and on the other side of the border. The Knicks are about four hours away and the traffic is not nice. Philly? About the same if you are willing to pay tolls.

Not only that, there’s not really a reasonable upstate collegiate rival. Some schools have had good runs, notably Niagara, St. Bonaventure and Buffalo. None have sustained success though, so Syracuse has a vast region pretty much to itself. If you want visual proof, look at the former Carrier Dome. Now called the JMA Wireless Dome, it seats up to 33,000 for basketball and they’ll sell it out for basketball.

Or they will when Syracuse is good and has good opponents. Last season, they averaged a shade under 19,000, which means a lot of empty seats.

We poked around and came up with an average ticket price of $79.00. Last season, on average, 14,000 tickets went unsold. At $79.00, that works out to $1,106,000. We’re not under any delusion that these numbers are precise, but no matter how you look at it, it’s a lot of money and, increasingly, that will translate into pressure on Autry. Add to that that by all reports Syracuse has not adapted well to the modern era and you can see Autry is potentially in a tight spot.

Unless of course he gets things going in the right direction. And presumably he still has time to do it.

What should we expect this year then?

Syracuse gets back JJ Starling, a 6-4 senior, and Donnie Freeman, a highly promising 6-9 sophomore who was limited to 14 games last season due to a foot injury. Since he was the highest rated Syracuse recruit since Carmelo Anthony, this was a major hit. Those are two pretty good guys to build around.

Syracuse loses big men Naheem McCleod and Eddie Lampkin, who both entered the portal hoping to get one more seasons but they appear to have failed in that endeavor. Lucas Taylor and Jyrare Davis also entered the portal, but they don’t appear to have found new homes. We think they were both also out of eligibility. Jaquan Carlos is now playing in Finland.

Elijah Moore is off to Utah, Kyle Cuff is a Mercer Bear, Petar Majstorovic will play for Long Beach State and Chance Westry heads back south, this time to UAB rather than Auburn. Chris Bell, who once boasted that he was the best shooter in the ACC, has a chance to back that up again: he’ll be at Cal this season, and so far, coach Mark Madsen is impressed with his marksmanship.

On the incoming side of the portal, Syracuse picks up Nait George (6-3 junior) and Ibrahim Souare (6-9 redshirt sophomore) from Georgia Tech, Nate Kingz, a 6-5 redshirt senior from Oregon State, Bryce Zephir, a 6-4 grad student from Montana State, Tyler Betsy, a 6-8 sophomore from Cincinnati and William Kyle, a 6-9 senior from UCLA.

George was never consistently good at Tech but occasionally he was really superb and he showed a huge competitive instinct. He averaged 12.2 points, 4.2 rebounds and 6.5 assists. He should take a lot of pressure off of Starling and let him concentrate on what he does best, which is to score.

Souare played in 30 games for Tech but didn’t have a major statistical impact, getting just 2.8. points and 3.6 rebounds in 17 minutes a night.

Kingz averaged 11.8 points and 2.5 rebounds last season for Oregon State, but he hit 44.6 on threes, which is obviously catnip to a coach. He could be a very useful addition, but most of us have no idea if he can defend. However, he likes Syracuse because, he says, “they really believe in me.” And that should count for something. He’ll have two years in Orange, assuming he stays.

Kingz started in D-II, then went JUCO before finally making D-I. It’s somewhat similar to the path that Cedric Coward took.

If you’re wondering about the name Kingz, his birth name is Meithof, but he spent a lot of time in foster homes and changed it to forge his own path. Here’s hoping he’s a Kingz on all the days he’s not playing Duke.

Zephir has an interesting path as well: he was 5-11 as a high school senior. He started at Chipola (JC), then transferred to North Texas, played one year and redshirted another. Then he went back to JUCO (Salt Lake Community College), then moved to Montana State. He’s not a great shooter – he hit just under 62 percent from the line and 47 percent overall from the floor – but he’s experienced and could help. Time will tell.

Betsy brings versatility and perimeter shooting. He told Syracuse.com that the staff told him that he was the missing piece to get to the NCAA tournament. He had a good start in his freshman year at Cincinnati, but ran into a wicked shooting slump and off to the bench he went. Betsy averaged 3.3 points and 1.5 rebounds. However, he was a Top 40 recruit who drew a lot of interest.

He also gained 20 lbs at Cincinnati, which is bound to help. As he suggested, a fresh start might help too.

Kyle didn’t get a lot of time at UCLA after transferring in from South Dakota State, but he is athletic and all Syracuse really needs from him is to defend around the basket, rebound, and get whatever easy baskets come his way. If he does that, he helps. If he does more, that’ll work out great for the Orange.

Five freshmen round out the roster: Sadiq White, 6-9/195, Kiyan Anthony (6-5), Luke Fennell (6-6), Tiefing Diawara (7-0/240) and Aaron Womack (6-6).

White is a Top 50 recruit out of Charlotte who finished up at IMG Academy. Recruiting rankings are really vague. Why? Because White was a Top 15 player who “fell.” Well his talent hasn’t changed. Other kids may have matured or worked harder, but White is still as talented as he was when he was a Top 15 player. Syracuse doesn’t have a massive center, but they have some nice athleticism up front and White will help with that and more if he puts on some weight.

Anthony’s name may ring a bell: he’s Carmelo’s kid. He’s making a splash already, having started a clothing line and apparently he was in the recent Travis Kelce American Eagle ad. All well and good, but like Duke’s Boozer twins, he has to live up to a famous father as Carmelo was the driving force behind Syracuse’s only national championship. There’s going to be a lot of pressure on Kiyan.

Fennell is a 6-6 Aussie guard. He mentioned Carmelo Anthony and the Dome as factors in choosing Syracuse. He’s listed as both a combo and point guard, but either way, it’s an advantage to be 6-6 in the backcourt.

Diawara is a native of Mali who spent several years in Italy before moving to the US. He’s a big kid but apparently raw. Chances are he’ll be a reserve this year but could emerge later.

Finally, there’s Womack. You never know, but just reading about him, he seems like a likable kid and confident. He told Zagsblog that “I would describe myself as an all-around player. I’m willing to do whatever it takes to win. I like to get a lot of shots up. I like to shoot threes. And when I get hot, I really get hot. I let it fly. On the defensive end I like to play the passing lanes to get steals and go down for a dunk. I like to use my length and athleticism. I like to go up and block shots off the glass. And I can get up for a dunk if I need to. I can attack the rim. I’m really an all-around player. If you close out on me, I’m going to the rim. If you have a hand down I’m shooting it.” 

He wasn’t highly recruited, but one writer described him as “smart.” Syracuse may have found a gem.

So what are they working with?

Freeman is back and finally unrestricted, so he should be a big help as soon as he’s up to speed. Starling had to carry too much of the offense last year but that should change. Presumably George will start at the beginning of the season, but Fennell could conceivably challenge him.

There are some big men to work with, with Souare, Kyle and Diowara. Or Autry might opt to run Freeman at center to exploit his versatility and athleticism. That would also open up a forward spot where Betsy, Kingz or White might emerge.

The biggest things for Syracuse are this: Freeman is healthy, Starling has some help and athleticism, depth and three point shooting all appear to have improved.

And while Jim Boeheim was not able to adapt to the new environment at the end of a long and successful career, Autry appears to be learning. He’s trying to up Syracuse’s financial game and hired a GM last summer, Alex Kline, who is interesting.

Kline started The Recruit Scoop in high school and has parlayed that into a career as an NBA scout and now he’s GM at his alma mater. He’s not the first GM or coach to develop an algorithm to identify players who will fit with his team, but he seems to be doing a solid job with his.

Hopefully last year’s 14-19 record was an aberration and in fairness, the Freeman injury really limited this team. Syracuse is not currently able to compete with the elite schools on the recruiting trail, but at that school, you should be able to. The weather is an issue – not everyone is going embrace Lake Effect snow storms and more than 10 feet of snow every winter – but otherwise, the tradition, passion, fans and facilities are there to do quite well. If Autry can start winning, the players will follow.