The Syracuse Orange (6-4) look to bounce back from their disappointing loss to Hofstra when they host the Mercyhurst Lakers (4-7) tonight in the JMA Dome. The game tips at 7:00 and will be streaming on ACCNX. Here\u2019s what we\u2019re watching for tonight:<\/p>\n
Kevin: A sense of urgency<\/p>\n
In the three Q1 games I saw (missed Iowa State), I felt that the Orange played with a lot of energy and intensity. That\u2019s been lacking the last two games and while I get that playing at the end of the semester and through illness against \u201csmaller\u201d schools isn\u2019t the same, they have to get back to Level 5. It\u2019s on the players and coaches. If the team comes out sluggish, then Autry needs to call on the press, or get someone in the game who wants to instill some enthusiasm. Syracuse needs a couple of big blowouts this week and I want to see them play with some desperation.<\/p>\n
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Dom: A bounce back from George<\/p>\n
His performance against Hofstra wasn\u2019t his finest. While Naithan George did have six assists, he didn\u2019t score a single point and missed all four of the shots he took, three of which came from three. Syracuse\u2019s offense has flatlined at times this year and George has to be more aggressive finding his shot. In turn, that will open up his playmaking abilities. The Orange have other avenues to improve (like intensity, execution on defense and free throw shooting), but I want to see him be more aggressive offensively.<\/p>\n
Max: Anything but free(throws)
We all know of Syracuse\u2019s free-throw struggles (56.8%, the worst rate in the country), but it won\u2019t be a significant disadvantage against a Mercyhurst team that shoots nearly as badly (61.8%, 355th per KenPom). Look for the Orange to get out quickly in transition to speed up a slow-paced Lakers team, and more importantly, avoid the foul line. Even so, both teams might combine for enough bricks at the charity stripe to build a third dorm on The Mount.<\/p>\n
Szuba: Rees and threes<\/p>\n
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Mercyhurst goes small across the roster so I look for the Orange to really try to improve rebounding in this matchup. Elsewhere, the Lakers defend the two a little better than the three, so can Syracuse start to connect from outside against a poor defensive team? The Orange really need these next three games to work on weaknesses before the start of ACC play.<\/p>\n
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What are you watching for tonight?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Syracuse Orange (6-4) look to bounce back from their disappointing loss to Hofstra when they host the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":63989,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[136,138,137,34208,16219,34209,34206,34207],"class_list":{"0":"post-63988","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-erie","8":"tag-erie","9":"tag-erie-headlines","10":"tag-erie-news","11":"tag-iowa-state","12":"tag-mercyhurst-lakers","13":"tag-naithan-george","14":"tag-syracuse-orange","15":"tag-the-orange"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63988","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63988"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63988\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63989"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63988"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63988"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63988"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}