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Tuesday against Pittsburgh, head coach Jim Boeheim turned to forward John Bol Ajak off the bench at the end of the first half. The Panthers pieced together a mini 9-0 run to take the lead, and Boeheim decided to go to Ajak — a sparsely used substitute — in place of freshman Benny Williams. Boeheim said it was because Ajak was playing really well in practice. 

So on Saturday, when his other forward, Jimmy Boeheim, wasn’t providing enough on the floor, he once again turned to something unorthodox: a three-guard lineup featuring Symir Torrence alongside Buddy Boeheim and Joe Girard III. 

Torrence played 15 minutes in Syracuse’s (8-9, 2-4 Atlantic Coast) five-point loss to Florida State (10-5, 4-2 ACC), his most in a conference game this season. Twelve of those minutes came in the second half, and he was on the floor until the final two minutes. Torrence helped fuel a late-game push that dissolved the Seminoles’ seven-point lead, though it ultimately wasn’t enough to prevent a last-second loss that dropped SU back below .500.

“I thought Sy(mir) was great, I thought he really did a great job getting it up,” Boeheim said. “The small lineup really turned things around, started playing well, and it worked out better than I thought, really.”

Boeheim rarely goes to his bench, relying heavily on his starting lineup instead — the Orange rank 356th of 358 teams in bench minutes (16.7%), according to KenPom. But he said he turned to Torrence because Girard was having trouble breaking Florida State’s press. Girard wasn’t carrying the ball up the floor consistently, Boeheim said. The starting point guard finished with more turnovers (five) than assists (three).

Jimmy played all 20 minutes in the first half but scored just four points on 2-of-6 field goals during the opening frame. He had a chance at the first bucket with a jump shot but couldn’t convert the shot. He had an off-day on offense, and though he grabbed seven rebounds, he didn’t offer much more on defense. Yet he stayed on the floor throughout the first half.

Eventually, with 14:30 remaining in the game, Boeheim inserted Torrence and removed Jimmy a minute later. Florida State played a full-court press for almost the entire game, applying constant pressure on the ball-handler and using a frequent rotation that featured playing time for 11 different players to keep the defenders fresh.

The Orange have struggled against the press all year, particularly Girard, who has frequently turned the ball over when under pressure. Torrence was best equipped to handle that press, Boeheim said. 

“We needed to play a small lineup to kind of break that pressure that they were giving us,” Cole Swider said after the game. “Obviously, we’ve had a problem dealing with pressure all year. Sy(mir) did a good job helping us just kind of break that press and get into our offense more smoothly.”

FSU has the tallest team in Division I basketball, per KenPom, but Swider said the small lineup with Torrence helped SU combat that. It changed FSU’s game plan and forced them to take out their “bigs,” he said. 

Torrence finished with four assists and SU’s only four bench points. On the first bucket, he drove in the lane and finished a layup 30 seconds after coming onto the floor in the second half. He made his second to extend SU’s lead to three points with under nine minutes left. 

Later, he dished to a wide-open Jesse Edwards for a dunk and found Buddy for a driving layup that cut FSU’s lead to one in the last three minutes. 

“I thought he got in the lane, made a couple buckets, had four assists. I thought his defense was good,” Boeheim said of Torrence. “I thought that lineup was good for us.”

Jimmy returned in place of Torrence for the final two minutes after struggling earlier. He was there for a clutch putback after Edwards missed the first try, lifting his total to six points, the second-fewest of his SU tenure. Jimmy was in position for the game-winning layup in the last 10 seconds but couldn’t get it to fall.

During Boeheim’s postgame press conference, the head coach did not directly address why he didn’t play Williams, the freshman forward, and instead elected to use the small lineup with three guards. Williams has played less than 10 minutes in three of SU’s last four games.

Torrence, however, provides a different skill set than Girard and seems more adept at handling the press. The backup point guard’s emergence could be crucial for an SU team with very little depth and a stacked conference schedule that includes five games in nine days later in February. 

“He did a good job, but obviously it was different than having Jimmy out there,” Swider said. “Something we got to get used to.”

Published on January 15, 2022 at 8:02 pm

Contact Roshan: rferna04@syr.edu | @Roshan_f16