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Syracuse plays its second of three straight home games on Saturday when it faces Florida State for the second time this season. Both teams enter off wins — with SU defeating Pittsburgh and FSU knocking off Miami on Tuesday — and currently sit in the middle-third of the Atlantic Coast Conference standings.

Against the Panthers, the Orange (8-8, 2-3 ACC) snapped a three-game losing streak to pull their record back to .500, with head coach Jim Boeheim saying postgame that they played “the best that (they’ve) really played all year” in the second half. Buddy Boeheim led all scorers with 24 points, connecting on five 3-pointers after hitting four in the previous two games combined while his older brother Jimmy Boeheim added 18 points and seven rebounds. But Jesse Edwards fouled out for the fifth consecutive game despite not picking up a foul in the opening half.

Here’s everything you need to know about the Seminoles (9-5, 3-2) before their 3 p.m. visit to the Carrier Dome.

All-time series

Syracuse leads 8-5.

Last time they played

The Orange trailed by eight points at halftime on Dec. 4, 2021, but stormed back in the second half — hitting 50% of their shots in the final frame — and held off a late FSU push to secure a 63-60 win. Buddy managed just six points, his fewest since scoring two in December 2020 against Northeastern, while other SU players like Joe Girard III (16 points), Cole Swider (16 points) and Jimmy (13 points) picked up the scoring load. 

Boeheim called the victory a “gutty win,” as the Seminoles shot just 28% from the field in the second half — 4-for-30 on 3-pointers overall — and it marked Syracuse’s second consecutive win after returning from the Battle 4 Atlantis tournament in the Bahamas. But according to ShotQuality, the Orange only win that game 17% of the time based on the shots each team took, and the website projected an 80-69 SU loss with those shots. Caleb Mills led Florida State with 16 points while Malik Osborne added 10 points and eight rebounds.

KenPom odds

Syracuse has a 56% chance to win, with a projected score of 76-74.

The Seminoles report

Florida State won its second game in a row on Tuesday, and in the process snapped Miami’s nine-game winning streak by defeating the Hurricanes 65-64. RayQuan Evans hit a pair of free throws in the final second to retake the lead, finishing with 11 total points shooting 4-of-8 from the field. Since Syracuse and Florida State last met, the Seminoles have gone 4-2 with wins over the Hurricanes, Louisville, NC State and Lipscomb — though the three conference wins were all by single-digits.

Their defense ranks 31st nationally in terms of adjusted efficiency, per KenPom, and they rank 23rd, 20th and 10th in defensive turnover, block and steal percentage, respectively. FSU also leads the ACC with its 9.86 steals per game average, with Evans’ team-high 4.2 steal percentage ranking 47th nationally. 

Offensively, Mills leads the Seminoles in scoring by averaging 12.6 points per game, while Osborne has converted 19-of-46 3-point attempts to lead them from beyond the arc. Osborne connected on two of FSU’s 3s the last time it played Syracuse. 

How Syracuse beats FSU

If Florida State took 30 3s again, it likely won’t make just four like the Seminoles did when the teams met five weeks ago. But the Orange could win this game by forcing FSU into a similar percentage from behind the arc while also finding a way to create more scoring opportunities against a defense that limited Buddy to just six points in their last meeting.

Swider’s ability to compile points if the Seminoles do bottle up Buddy again might serve as the most important key, especially if the zone defense reverts back to its porous identity of the first 15 games. Against FSU in December, Swider took a season-high 15 shots and tied for the team lead with 16 points. Boeheim has repeated throughout the recent stretch of games that he’s looking for Swider to be more aggressive with his shot selection, capitalizing on and converting open looks when they emerge. That opportunity could come against a defense that allowed Swider to get those shots earlier this season.

Stat to know: 79.4 inches

Florida State is the tallest team on average — at 79.4 inches — in the country, a stat that takes into account the height of players who have played more than 10% of their team’s minutes and weighs it by their overall number of minutes played, according to KenPom. Syracuse ranks fifth for this stat, with an average height of 78.9 inches, and that’s largely due to their small forward and shooting guard height, which ranks third and fifth in the country, respectively. 

For the Seminoles, their top ranking in the category stems from the No. 1 point guard height, No. 3 shooting guard height and No. 7 center height.

Player to watch: Matthew Cleveland, guard, No. 35

Cleveland hasn’t started a game for Florida State in his freshman season, but he still averages 22.3 minutes per game off the bench and sits third on the Seminoles in scoring with 10.8 points per game. He also leads FSU with 4.8 fouls drawn per 40 minutes.

The 6-foot-7 guard from Atlanta, Georgia was named to the Julius Erving Watch List — presented annually to the country’s best small forward — and also earned ACC freshman of the week honors earlier in January, following his 13-point, nine-rebound output against NC State two days prior. Cleveland has only shot 18.8% from behind the arc on his 16 opportunities and 56.5% on free throws, though, despite drawing the second-most foul shots on the team (46). But on Jan. 8 against Louisville, he flashed his potential by tying his career-high with 17 points shooting 7-of-8 from the field across 27 minutes. 

In FSU’s game against Syracuse on Dec. 4, Cleveland scored six points in 18 minutes — hitting two of his six shots while drawing three free throws. His role has gradually grown since then, as he’s now topped 20-plus minutes of court time in three of the last four games, and could be someone who is able to lure Edwards, or other Syracuse forwards, into foul trouble on Saturday while attacking the space inside the 3-point arc.

Published on January 14, 2022 at 8:49 pm

Contact Andrew: arcrane@syr.edu | @CraneAndrew