After the young Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets grew up a little bit against the UTEP Miners, the Syracuse Orange completed the other half of the 2010 Legends Classic Championship Game pairing by coming back to slip past the Michigan Wolverines. Cuse is 5-0 and ranked No. 10, but they haven't been dominant in their past couple games -- they only outlasted the William & Mary Tribe, Sagarin's No. 196 team, by three.
A year after being the nation's most efficient shooters, the Orange haven't been scoring particularly well, hitting only 40.8 percent of their shots. Which is, of course, slightly better than Tech's rate. Even in last night's win, their most impressive game this year, the Jackets shot only 35.8 percent from the floor.
Syracuse has been lethal on defense, however, holding opponents to 34.6 percent. There's your key to the game, folks.
Senior forward Rick Jackson leads the way for Cuse, racking up over 12 points and rebounds and two blocks per game. Distributor Scoop Jardine is a dual threat a la Tech guard Iman Shumpert, averaging 12 points and seven assists. Forward Kris Joseph and guard Brandon Triche are also capable of scoring double digits.