Let’s get something straight: Gerry McNamara didn’t ask for this. No matter how he plays, he’s the same broken record after every game, repeating clich after clich about how it’s always about wins and losses, never himself. And I think he genuinely means every word of it. He’s never talked himself up, never said he’s a star.

But Syracuse fans as well as the local and national media have long showered him with star status, and zilch can convince them otherwise. To them, McNamara is not just a great player, he’s a legend. Even before this season started they made No. 3 easily the most beloved player in Syracuse history and possibly the most adored active player in all of college basketball.

Talk about selective memory. Or maybe it’s denial. But there’s no question his weaknesses have finally been fully exposed this season, and somebody has to say what’s long overdue: Gerry McNamara is overrated.

Now don’t get me wrong; I remember the six 3-pointers in the 2003 title game against Kansas, the 43-point outburst in the 2004 first round against BYU, all those game-winning 3’s. A good player who’s hit many big shots? Of course.

But a great player who dominates games? Not even close. All his highlight-reel heroics came while playing with actual great players who took up defenders and took away pressure – Carmelo Anthony and Hakim Warrick. Now McNamara is the man, and he can’t shoulder the burden. He and the team are having their worst seasons during his career.

The stats don’t lie: McNamara is having his worst shooting year in 2005-06, both from the 3-point line (32.3 percent) and overall (33.3). Discounting the Orange’s last game, when he scored two points before leaving with a charley horse late in the first half of SU’s 86-84 overtime win against Rutgers, he shot 7-for-33 in his last four games from downtown. Not what SU was expecting during conference season from the player who is the school’s all-time leader in 3-pointers.

What it comes down to is that McNamara cannot create his own shot, which wasn’t a problem in his first three seasons. Not only did defenses focus on Anthony or Warrick, McNamara had Craig Forth to set screens for him. Though McNamara has been the team’s point guard since he was a freshman, a fact Syracuse head coach Jim Boeheim always reminds reporters in defense of his senior leader, he fed off others feeding him the ball. He’s a 3-point specialist. Catch and shoot. It suited his game perfectly.

But when defenses keyed on him this season, all those open looks McNamara saw in the past have disappeared. No more catch and shoot. Instead, he’s morphed into a more traditional point guard with a propensity for shooting the 3. As he has said himself all year, the team performs better when he doesn’t have to force shots, and he’s averaging a career-high 5.8 assists. But he still hoists too many contested 3’s, and has subsequently failed to find a rhythm almost the entire season.

You could make a case for McNamara actually being the third-best player on the team behind Demetris Nichols and Eric Devendorf. Finding himself in more McNamara-like trances than McNamara himself this season, Nichols has easily been the most consistent shooter on the Orange. Devendorf is shooting a team-high 40.3 percent from the 3-point line and drives the lane better than McNamara. In the eight conferences games, Nichols is averaging 16.3 points to McNamara and Devendorf’s 14.9.

In terms of the team as a whole, there is a disturbing backward trend. The more prominent role McNamara has had, the worse the team has done. He’s gone from national champions to a loss in the Sweet 16 to a loss in the first round. Now, in what was finally supposed to be his team, Syracuse is struggling just to win 20 games and make the NCAA Tournament.

To be specific, when McNamara left the Rutgers game, Syracuse was trailing by five points. The first five-game losing streak in Boeheim’s career, and quite possibly the NIT, was staring the Orange in the face. But the Syracuse offense became more balanced with Josh Wright at the point, and SU eventually won on a dramatic buzzer-beating 3-pointer that Terrence Roberts never would have taken with McNamara in the game.

‘McNamara would’ve helped them, but I don’t know how much he would’ve helped them,’ Rutgers head coach Gary Waters said after the game. ‘I can’t say because he was gone that we were better, because they played like a team.’

Now to say Syracuse is a better team without McNamara is obviously wrong. But the Rutgers game presented the clearest example of how McNamara is not the superstar an above-average team cannot win without.

Again, nothing against McNamara. The only thing on his mind today is an upset of No. 1 Connecticut. He could care less about this argument, and I admire that about him.

It’s the fans, the media who need to snap back to reality. Look at the numbers. Watch the games. Gerry McNamara is no legend.

Ethan Ramsey is the sports editor at The Daily Orange, where his columns appear occasionally. E-mail him at egramsey@gmail.com.

Published on February 28, 2006 at 12:00 pm