ISTANBUL — The moment I realized betting against Jim Boeheim was a no good, very bad idea came last Sunday, more than 6,000 miles away from Detroit in a small, Middle Eastern hotel room with a low-quality video stream.

In Tel Aviv, Israel, about a dozen Syracuse students and two professors crammed in to watch a lagging Reddit stream of an apparently mighty mismatch: Trendy Final Four pick Michigan State versus play-in Syracuse. Yet the Orange landed as many punches as it took.

When the game was over, when this maddening, impossibly resilient team had won again, the room in Tel Aviv exploded in cheers that made neighbors poke their heads out from their rooms.

In the midst of the chaos, I sat stunned and watched the upset’s architect, Syracuse head coach Jim Boeheim, simply stride through the handshake line. Syracuse was never supposed to be here and yet it was. A grainy TV had never provided a clearer picture.

On Friday night, when No. 11 seed Syracuse (23-13, 8-10 Atlantic Coast) dances on in the Sweet 16 against No. 2 seed Duke (28-7, 13-5), I won’t be in Omaha, Nebraska, like I really wanted to and am supposed to as a member of The Daily Orange’s men’s basketball beat team. Until very recently, I wasn’t even in the same hemisphere as the team, unless it took a slight detour and ended up in various shawarma spots in Istanbul.

This predicament traces back to early January, when the Orange started struggling and someone who’s watched a lot of Syracuse games told me, “This is the worst offensive team they’ve had in maybe 20 years.”

A few days earlier, a friend had texted me about taking a capstone class called “Political Reporting” that included a 10-day trip to Israel over Spring Break with the Jerusalem Press Club. I shook it off at first because, well, I figured Syracuse would be in the Tournament. I wanted to cover the postseason run. But then I emailed the professor to see if there were any spots open. Just in case.

About a week later, before I officially joined the class, I carefully considered the Orange. The youth might pan out. Tyus Battle might take over. Boeheim might be right and the extreme minutes might not hurt his players. What if Syracuse went on a historic run and I missed it?

Here I’m talking with, from left to right, Majik, 13, and Hamad, 10. The boys said they were brothers and collect anything recyclable to put into big cloth type of wheelbarrow and take to a redemption center to earn money. Courtesy of Simon Perez

What I knew overwhelmed what I thought could be. The bench looked thinner every game. The difficult conference slate loomed in a hyper-competitive ACC. The offense really consisted of three players going one-on-one, and Boeheim deemed that “a problem” but never seemed to have tangible methods to make things better.

I signed up, thinking Syracuse wouldn’t make the Tournament at all, let alone the Sweet 16.

When our beat team drafted postseason coverage, Tomer Langer and Matthew Gutierrez picked the NCAA Tournament/NIT first round. I snagged the second round and Final Four and assumed Syracuse would never get there.

Then they did.

Syracuse made the Tournament as the last team. OK, how long could it last?

They beat Arizona State. It’s one game. Relax.

They beat TCU and nemesis Jamie Dixon. No, I’m not worried. Why do you ask?

They beat Michigan State. Damn. OK. Breathe. Don’t worry, at least I’ll be back soon.

After Syracuse flipped MSU, I tried throwing together a travel plan. One of these four host regional cities, though, is not like the other: Los Angeles, Atlanta, Boston and Omaha. Our class’ return flight left Tel Aviv at 1 a.m. local time Wednesday and was scheduled to land at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City later that afternoon Eastern time. From there, I could bus to Syracuse, then leave there immediately on a road trip and make it to Omaha.

That never happened. Just before 4:30 a.m. at our connector in Istanbul, the icon next to our flight on the big board flipped from green to red and now read: “CANCELLED.” Scrambling to delay driving out west or finding last-minute flights proved useless.

The Turkish Airlines bus bounced down the highway toward a Courtyard by Marriott. We drove by airline headquarters and government offices and mosque minarets peeking out from neighborhoods packed tightly with buildings. We swerved around vehicles haphazardly pulled over and probably about a dozen boys crowded on the road’s shoulder, looking for a ride. How different things would look if we had been driving toward downtown Omaha and the hotel The D.O. had booked there, a Courtyard by Marriott.

Our group was stuck in Istanbul for two days. At first, a Turkish Airlines employee had told us they would create a new flight to New York, but it never happened. We somehow finagled a flight into Boston late Thursday instead. Too late to cover. So, when Syracuse takes the floor facing its longest odds yet, I won’t recommend whether to bet on Boeheim or not.

I’ll just suggest not betting against him.

Published on March 22, 2018 at 11:30 pm