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Femi Odukale drove toward the block and, when surrounded by a pair of Syracuse defenders, kicked a pass to the opposite wing. It was midway through the second half, and Pittsburgh trailed by 16 when Au’Diese Toney caught Odukale’s pass and launched a 3-pointer.

The shot bounced off, but Odukale pivoted back toward the basket, jumped around Alan Griffin and converted the put-back. That sequence — someone taking advantage of a soft box-out, swimming through an SU defender and grabbing an offensive rebound — occurred six times over the next 10 minutes as the Panthers went on a 28-11 run to close the game.

In Syracuse’s 63-60 loss to Pittsburgh, the Orange were outrebounded 49-33 — including 20-9 on the offensive boards. Quincy Guerrier, SU’s best rebounder, spent most of the second half on the bench with four fouls. Bourama Sidibe, the original starting center, missed his seventh straight game because of a torn meniscus. Frank Anselem didn’t play because of quarantine, and Woody Newton only logged five minutes because he hadn’t practiced beforehand. All of that, all those absences to the Orange’s post group, led to their worst rebounding performance this season and contributed to the blown 18-point lead against the Panthers. 

“The boards (are) a problem for us anyway,” head coach Jim Boeheim said postgame game. “With Quincy out, we’re unbelievably thin and small, there’s no question about that.”

Sidibe’s injury in the opener against Bryant minimized Syracuse’s post depth. It forced the Orange to rely heavily on Guerrier, Griffin and Marek Dolezaj, which worked only sometimes. SU could get away with rebounding flaws against lower-tier nonconference opponents but was outrebounded 42-26 in a loss to Rutgers on Dec. 8. 

The Scarlet Knights tallied three offensive rebounds in the first five minutes. With seven minutes left in the first half, Guerrier didn’t box out Myles Johnson as he easily worked around the Orange’s sophomore.

“We’re going to have problems on the boards against good rebounding teams,” Boeheim said after Rutgers. “Our young centers are nowhere ready to play, and we see that every day in practice.”

Syracuse needed Sidibe back to help with rebounding, shot-blocking and an overall interior defense — three elements that have combined to sink the Orange in their two losses. Even in Syracuse’s overtime, come-from-behind win over Buffalo, the Bulls used backdoor cuts and a career-high 27 points from Josh Mballa to score 58 total points in the paint. When John Bol Ajak subbed in, the UB forward lurked underneath the basket behind Ajak and created enough space to rebound and score.

After Syracuse’s next three games were postponed, it appeared the narrow win against the Bulls would be their last without Sidibe. Given the initial timeline and his progress, a return against the Panthers was likely when Boeheim hinted on Monday that SU would have a full roster. The center practiced “five or six days in a row,” and Syracuse thought he would play, Boeheim said postgame, but soreness kept Sidibe sidelined all of Wednesday afternoon. Without him, the interior struggles continued.

With Syracuse leading in the first half, Pitt’s Gerald Drumgoole Jr.’s 3-pointer bounced off, but Terrell Brown secured the offensive rebound over Dolezaj and Griffin. Dolezaj said postgame that Pittsburgh often had four players, including Brown, crashing the boards. “It’s really hard to stop them,” he said. SU allowed the Panthers to grab 12 offensive rebounds in the second half alone.

“Quincy was in foul trouble, and Alan’s not the tallest one, (and) I’m not the heaviest one,” Dolezaj said. “It was really hard.” 

Slowly, those mistakes started adding up. William Jeffress’ rebound led to a layup. Abdoul Karim Coulibaly’s led to a 3-pointer, allowing the Panthers to reset their possession before finding a shot over Kadary Richmond on the left wing.

Then the final offensive rebound came, the 20th, the one that stung Syracuse most of all, when Toney tipped in a missed 3-pointer to give Pitt to win. But it was the 19 before, as well as all the other interior errors compounding them, that brought the game to that point in the first place.

Published on January 7, 2021 at 12:10 am

Contact Andrew: arcrane@syr.edu | @CraneAndrew