Stephen F. Austin
Syracuse
SFA Falls To No. 3 Syracuse
3/20/2009 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
March 20, 2009
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MIAMI (AP) -
By TIM REYNOLDS
Associated Press
Exactly five years after its last NCAA tournament win, Syracuse took a dominant route back to the second round.
Jonny Flynn scored 16 points, Rick Jackson and Arinze Onuaku each added 12 and the third-seeded Orange cruised past NCAA first-timer Stephen F. Austin 59-44 Friday in a South regional matchup.
Syracuse (27-9) ran out to a 20-4 lead, never letting the Southland Conference champions get anything going, and will meet either Arizona State or Temple in Sunday's second round.
Benson Akpan led Stephen F. Austin (24-8) with 12 points, with Nick Shaw adding 10. The Lumberjacks missed 12 of their first 13 shots, and didn't connect from 3-point range until Walt Harris hit from the left wing with 11:25 remaining -- on their 16th try from beyond the arc.
They finished 2-for-21 from 3-point range, and that played perfectly into Syracuse's hands.
By the end, the only drama remaining was if Syracuse would turn in its best defensive showing in NCAA history. In 80 games, Syracuse's all-time low for NCAA points allowed was 43 against Princeton in 1992 -- and Jereal Scott made sure it stayed that way, hitting two free throws for the Lumberjacks with 12.9 seconds left to close the scoring.
Syracuse's 2-3 zone frustrated the Lumberjacks from the outset. Stephen F. Austin didn't score on any of the first six possessions where it tried to score from the post; combine that with the frigid shooting from the outside, and the Lumberjacks' first NCAA trip was destined to be a short one.
That, and they didn't have any answer for Jackson and Onuaku inside.
Jackson set the tone immediately, blocking Matt Kingsley's shot on the first possession of the game, then setting up Onuaku with a pass from the high post for an easy score that got the Orange on the board a few seconds later.
If there was any hope for another 14-over-3-seed upset like the one Southland member Northwestern State pulled over Iowa three years ago, it quickly vanished.
Flynn got his first score with 17:06 left in the half, making it 6-0, then took his spot atop the Syracuse zone, clapped his hands three times and yelled to no one in particular, "Turn it up."
The Orange responded.
Playing without top reserve Kristof Ongenaet -- sidelined by a flu bug that hit some members of the Syracuse travel party -- the Orange were still never threatened. Harris and Jackson were too big for the Lumberjacks to handle, Flynn freed himself from defenders several times with an array of crossover dribbles and ball fakes, and Syracuse led by 26 early in the second half.
Stephen F. Austin led the nation in 3-point field goal defense this year, and lived up to that billing. The Orange were 2-for-16 from long range, plus committed 21 turnovers to the Lumberjacks' six.
It didn't matter, thanks to a 51-32 edge in rebounding and holding Stephen F. Austin to 25 percent shooting on the afternoon.
POST-GAME QUOTES
March 20, 2009
Benson Akpan Josh Alexander Danny Kaspar Matt Kingsley
Syracuse 59 Stephen F. Austin 44
COACH Danny Kaspar: I just want to congratulate Syracuse on their win. They're playing some very good basketball in the last month, three weeks to a month. They played very well and deserve a lot of the credit for what happened out there today. Jonny Flynn is something special, and he was knocking us up pretty good in there with his penetration, and I thought that caused us fits the first half, his ability to get in the lane or pick-and-roll, as I said, a very good job.
But I also feel that, and I think you guys are going to agree with me, that we didn't play up to our capabilities. I think there was a bad case of the shakes with some of us, and even when that settled down, we just couldn't get it going. I'm very proud of this team. They've overcome some injuries to some key people throughout the year, and they really played well down the stretch within our league, and I'm not going to let today's loss take away from that.
Q. Josh, I think you missed your first four or five, and none of you guys really could get anything going those first ten minutes. What were the emotions going through your body at that point? Was it disappointment? Was it anger, frustration, all of the above? What were those first ten minutes like?
Josh Alexander: Kind of frustrating. I know we can't make every shot, but I mean, I missed some easy lay-ups, jump shots. They was giving us the jump shot and we just had to stand there and hit them in the first couple minutes of the game, and we just couldn't hit. That's how we got off to such a slow start.
Q. Was it the shakes like Coach said?
Josh Alexander: Maybe a little bit, but not as much as you would think of. We just had to hit some shots and we didn't.
Q. Matt, just maybe a comment on just how big those guys are. They dominated early and really a lot of dunks. They had their way inside pretty much the whole game.
Matt Kingsley: They're a large group of guys, and it's just a pretty big transition from most of the big men in the Southland Conference to some of the biggest guys in the Big East.
Q. Benson, you stepped up when Matt was on the bench, 12 points, career high. Where did that come from? How were you able to do that?
Benson Akpan: I just went out there and played like we do every day on game days.
Q. Matt, Syracuse left the Big East Tournament talking about winning it all. There's probably a few people out there that think they're capable. After seeing them up close now for 40 minutes, what kind of appreciation do you have for them and how far do you think they can go in this thing?
Matt Kingsley: I think they can go pretty far. They may go pretty far, and I think they're a good team. I was expecting them to be a good team, and they're exactly what I expected.
Q. Danny, how do you not let today take away from 24 wins and getting here and all those good things that happened to you for the first time this year?
COACH Danny Kaspar: You know, we talked about that before the game. We've talked a lot about understanding that the biggest opponent we're going to face is within our own locker room. It's ourselves. We talked about that during the preseason, during the season, and in talking about the teams we played, both the non-conference and conference. I think whatever you're talking about, the enemy within is the worst enemy.
Let's face it, Josh, I don't think Josh really had the shakes, he just wasn't hitting anything. He's had games like this. He went through a slump midway through conference that was the worst I've ever seen. And Matt seemed intimidated by those big kids. That's why I thought I've got to go with Benson, and I thought Benson was playing very well.
You know, you talk to the team after the game and you just tell them you're proud of them, that you love them and you care for them, and thank you, and that's what was said. That is a high character group of young men in that locker room. The last thing I wanted them to know as we complete this season was I was very proud of them and they have nothing to be ashamed of, that they've done a lot of great things for Stephen F. Austin men's basketball program and Stephen F. Austin State University, and they did it with hard work, a lot of talent, hard work and some great character.
Q. Could you talk about the problems that the two big kids, Jackson and Onuaku, presented for you guys?
COACH Danny Kaspar: Well, they did, and really we talked about how they like to block shots, and you've got to shot fake and go up. Nick Shaw got two shots early in the game which are really not a shot fake but turning around and seeing a 6'9" 240-pounder or a 6'9" 270-pounder. We lost our poise as far as what to do once we got the ball inside.
The message that was given to our players is if you shot fake, they'll go up. It's got to be quick because they're coming in. They'll strip you if you're not. If you shot fake, go up into them, get to the foul line. As you can see we shot 10 free throws, so we didn't do that. As of those 10 free throws, I believe bigs got eight. So that's been a little bit of a problem for us all year long. We have not gotten to the free-throw line like we should.
And you know, where I might look in the mirror and say if I had to do it again I might go to that 1-3-1 zone earlier. We were so successful with our man defense all year, I didn't want to send a message to our kids that I'm going to give up on it early. But the 1-3-1 did bother them. I don't think they prepared any for it, and perhaps we should have gone to it a little sooner.
