SYRACUSE, N.Y. — Syracuse’s loss to Hofstra on Saturday had some putting head coach Adrian Autry on the hot seat. Although a 76-62 win over 4-8 Mercyhurst might not be the most convincing win of the season, Autry’s squad at least put a few of the puzzle pieces together.
Captain J.J. Starling came blazing out of the gates once again with 10 points in less than five minutes of play. He finished with 15, sharing the team lead with senior William Kyle III, who added 10 rebounds to complete his third double-double of the season.
“[Kyle III] puts a lot of pressure on the rim and is just relentless,” Autry said. “He does everything. Initially, I thought it was just going to be on one side of the ball, but he’s definitely surpassed the impact that we thought he would have on the offensive side.”
The Orange were physical, grabbing 39 boards for their third best performance of the season.
“There’s a lot of things that I think people are not appreciating about this group and the way they fight,” Autry said.
One of the largest puzzle pieces missing to this point was free throws. The Orange entered the night as the worst free throw shooting team in the country. They emerged hitting a season best 75% of their shots from the charity stripe.
“I told you guys that we would get better shooting free throws, right?” Autry said. “You just keep shooting. It’s all work.”
There were some blemishes in the win. Syracuse turned the ball over 10 times in the first half and finished with 16, just three shy of their worst ball handling game of the season in a 95-64 loss to Iowa State.
“We were preaching play fast, and with that comes some turnovers,” Starling said. “But we’re going to keep playing fast. We’re going to get those out and clean some things up.”
Most glaringly of all, the Orange were outscored by the Lakers 39-37 in the second half. After the loss to Hofstra, freshman Kiyan Anthony noted the team’s faulty tendency to play down to their opponent’s level.
“We have to do a better job of just putting these teams away early and keeping our foot on the gas going into the second half,” Anthony said. “We only won by 14 points. That’s unacceptable to us. We know we are better than that.”
Syracuse has just two non-conference games left in Northeastern and Stonehill to return to Autry’s “Level 5” standard before ACC play.
“You guys know when it’s Level 5,” Starling said. “Tennessee was Level 5, and that’s exactly why we got the results. It’s felt through the whole building, and lately we haven’t been that.”
Tip off against Northeastern is set for Saturday at 4 p.m. in the JMA Wireless Dome.