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NEW YORK, NY — Buddy Boeheim took two steps and one dribble after Joe Girard III’s outlet pass reached him with 11:56 left in the first half, and he pulled up for a transition 3-pointer in front of a Villanova defender. It was a sequence that — at least for the pre-shot stages — unfolded the way so many others did last March, when Buddy and his 3-pointers carried Syracuse to the Sweet 16 and thrust his name into NBA Draft conversations.

Buddy always had the one-dribble pull-up shot in transition. The swish of the net usually followed. But on that attempt against the Wildcats, it missed the rim altogether. It bounced long off the backboard and harmlessly into a pair of Villanova hands. Two possessions later, Buddy curled around a Jimmy Boeheim screen but fired his mid-range jumper long, too. And then with 9:39 left until halftime, he crossed his dribble outside the 3-point arc, clearing an extra step of space between him and Eric Dixon and missed his third consecutive shot.

After making his first two shots of the game, Buddy didn’t connect on another shot — his final make — until there were seven minutes left in the second half. In between those baskets were 12 misses and a tight Villanova defense that didn’t pull off him, or Syracuse’s other shooters, even when Jimmy or Jesse Edwards took their defenders one-on-one to the net. What resulted in the Orange’s 67-53 loss on Tuesday was Buddy’s second consecutive game with both single-digit points and zero made 3-pointers, just the second time that’s happened since he became a starter in 2019.

He’s been in slumps before, just like every shooter has. The most recent one came last season, when contact tracing sidelined him and a later bout with COVID-19 forced a gradual return back into SU’s lineup after a program-wide pause. Buddy embarked on a 7-for-27 stretch before the calendar flipped to January, but he still finished over 38% by the time the season ended.

There was another one during his freshman year too, before he was a starter and tasked with playing 30-plus minutes every game, he opened 3-for-20 from beyond the arc across his first six games before eventually solidifying his makes. The next step after that, then, came when Buddy honed his ability to create an interior shot off the dribble and not become solely reliant on 3-pointers.

This time, though, it’s different. Buddy will never get the open shots he once had, and rightfully so. To go on a tear like he did last March, he’ll need to fight through contested shots and congested defenses. He’ll need to find a way to take those interior-game evolutions from seasons and thrust them into the next gear. Last March changed the way college defenses will forever play Buddy, and now, the negative effects of that are starting to show.

“He got a couple open 3s but that’s after the game’s been going for a long time. They’re hard to make when you haven’t gotten any all game,” head coach Jim Boeheim said postgame.

Buddy’s no longer surrounded by players like Quincy Guerrier or Alan Griffin who could also string together 3-pointers if need be. He’s no longer ignited by a drive-and-kick guard like Kadary Richmond who forced defenses to shade over on his drives, leaving open space on the wing. This season, Buddy’s the true focal point of the offense, and will be over Syracuse’s final dozen-plus games, too. Performances like Jimmy had Tuesday could help open up more opportunities if it turns into a formula that SU can beat teams with, but that hasn’t proven to be sustainable in the long term yet.

Buddy’s been strong off the dribble, Boeheim said, and that’s the approach every team makes him take. Sometimes against Villanova, Syracuse tried to draw the switch on the pick and roll with Edwards, but that was rarely open. Instead, the Orange resorted to letting Edwards and Jimmy work their defenders one-on-one as Villanova guards stayed pressed to Buddy on the outside.

“Just stay off the ball, stay in the corner and let Jimmy go,” Buddy said. “If he does leave, move, get open, try to help him out. But I think it’s good to just let him go and if no one’s going to help, just let him keep going.”

Buddy’s still averaging 17.7 points per game this season, but he’s shooting just 25.8% from 3. He hasn’t made more than three 3-pointers in a game this season. Even during his slow start last year, he still passed that number once — four in the season-opener against Bryant. Teams have figured out how to play defense against him, or at least throw him off balance and make him rely on 2-point fadeaways or mid-range jumpers with no consistency.

It’s a blueprint, a solution, to crack the indefensible version of Buddy that took over at the end of Syracuse’s season last year. Heading into this season, the reality emerged that the Orange’s offense might just, again, go as far as Buddy takes it.

But now a new one’s started to surface: that teams can learn how to defend him. That teams can guard him more tightly, get away with it and force him into shots that cause slumps. And that’s why this recent stretch might be more difficult to reverse than the others that came before it.

The game was won when…

Syracuse led by two, 45-43, with 12 minutes left when Villanova ripped off three consecutive 3-pointers to take the lead for good. The final two came from the same spot — right at the top of the key — by Collin Gillespie and Justin Moore to put Villanova up seven. Then more offensive rebounding issues kicked in, and the deficit only swelled from there before settling at 14 when the final horn sounded.

A quick basket by Jimmy in the paint halted the Wildcats’ run, but Jermaine Samuels converted another 3-pointer at the other end to complete the 12-2 run shown in the chart below, via KenPom, where Villanova’s win percentage rose significantly.

Quote of the night: Jim Boeheim on Syracuse’s lack of depth over the years

“We haven’t had that in a long time. You’re going back a few years. We haven’t had anybody that has come off the bench in the last few years that has been effective. You’ll have to go back to, I don’t know, what are you going back to Dion Waiters? That was eight years ago … Frank comes in, he’s giving us some good minutes. Symir gave us some. But we’re limited coming off the bench. We got to get it done with the guys that are in there … I’d like to have Dion Waiters but I don’t think he’s eligible anymore.”

Richmond, for one, would beg to differ.

Stat to know: 4

Syracuse finished with just four assists against the Wildcats, its fewest in a game since recording the same number against Clemson on Jan. 28, 2020.

Game ball: Jimmy Boeheim

Jimmy’s 21 points were just five short of his Syracuse career-high — 26 against Indiana — and he attempted a team-high 19 shots against the Wildcats. Boeheim said postgame that Villanova’s defenders didn’t peel off of Girard, Buddy and Cole Swider, leaving opportunities for Jimmy to navigate his matchup one-on-one inside. Jimmy’s attempted the most 2s out of any SU player this season, and he’s made nearly 50% of them.

Three final points:

Edwards managing his fouls, only SU player with free throws
After fouling out in Syracuse’s previous two games, Edwards ended the game with 31 minutes and just three fouls — never having to miss extended time due to foul trouble.

Edwards finished with his lowest shooting percentage of the season, but he added three blocks and complemented Jimmy as an interior threat. It didn’t necessarily come with makes from block to block, but Edwards shot 15 free throws, a career-high by nine attempts. The glaring part of that stat was those were the only foul shots that Syracuse had last night, the first time only one SU player shot free throws in a game since at least 1999.

Swider against his former team
Swider scored Syracuse’s first basket of the game against the Wildcats, hitting a 3 in transition. It was his first game playing Villanova since transferring to SU this offseason — leaving the school where he developed his reputation as a 3-point specialist, hitting 40.2% of his shots from beyond the arc last year.

Beyond success in exhibition games, Swider’s shooting touch hasn’t surfaced outside of a game against Arizona State where he connected on 4-of-5 deep balls. That struggle continued against Villanova after making that first shot, as he only made one more the rest of the game. But he led SU in rebounding with 12, tying his Syracuse debut against Lafayette for his most with the Orange.

“Unbelievable rebounding, he was a beast on the glass,” Villanova head coach Jay Wright said postgame of Swider. “That was the first time we’ve ever done that, played against one of our former players. I can’t say I enjoyed it, to be honest. I was just trying not to look at him.”

“Very uncomfortable, to be honest with you. I hope we don’t have to do that again.”

Same old rebounding story
Where does Syracuse go from here with the rebounding after allowing 27 offensive rebounds, and 57 overall, against Villanova? “I’m not gonna change anything,” Boeheim said. “We have to rebound better.”
The Orange have the second-worst rebounding defense in the ACC, trailing only NC State, and allow 39.44 per game — nearly 10 more than Boston College, which has the top rebounding numbers in the conference.

Next up: Georgetown

Syracuse faces its second former Big East rival in a week when it travels to face the Hoyas on Saturday, its final road game before returning back to the Carrier Dome for four straight games. Georgetown hasn’t beat a team ranked inside the KenPom top 200 this season, and lost its top three scorers from last year’s team — ranking 272nd in minutes continuity, per KenPom.

Published on December 8, 2021 at 7:28 pm

Contact Andrew: arcrane@syr.edu | @CraneAndrew