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Butterflies roam the stomach. Hands numb, throats dry. Nerves run down the spine. The clock dwindles.
Except tight games haven’t affected Syracuse. The Orange have been there too many times to be deterred.
No. 4 SU (12-3, 7-2 Atlantic Coast) has been pushed to the brink throughout its 12-game win streak. Six of the Orange’s last seven victories were decided by two goals or fewer, including four one-score games. That paradigm hit an extreme Saturday, when it took Syracuse four overtimes to vanquish then-No. 15 Notre Dame. But close games are expected when your schedule is the nation’s hardest and features 11 ranked matchups.
With so many close calls, you’d think the Orange would sit around .500. You’d be wrong.
SU thrives when uncomfortable, going 6-1 in two-score games this season. That didn’t transpire last year, when it finished 4-3 in those contests.
“Dog fights,” Thorpe said of Syracuse’s slate. “We’ve been in a lot of them this year, but the kids have made some plays.”
SU’s clutch gene reached a new level Saturday against the Fighting Irish, when it trailed at halftime for the first time since its season-opening loss to then-No. 7 Maryland. The Orange responded with a three-goal gush but couldn’t separate themselves from ND, which scores the fourth-most goals in the conference.
We haven’t played a full 60 minutes. We got to string together good quarters, good halves.
Regy Thorpe, Syracuse head coach
Knotted at 9-9, it seemed all 24 players on the field lost confidence. Syracuse and Notre Dame split five shots each across the first three overtimes. Then, orbiting the 12-meter arc, Caroline Trinkaus let one fly and ripped mesh at the quadruple-overtime horn to terminate Syracuse’s longest game in program history.
“It’s tough to be on the wrong side of that like Notre Dame is,” Thorpe said.
When the season began, it was Syracuse that repeatedly found itself on the wrong side, leading to its 0-3 start. Maryland led by at least four throughout the second half, top-ranked North Carolina went up three early in the fourth quarter and then-No. 3 Stanford scored back-to-back goals in the game’s final minutes to pull ahead.
That’s flipped ever since. The Orange commanded then-No. 4 Northwestern by five scores late in their upset win. They also cruised past then-No. 13 Loyola, Louisville, California, Virginia Tech and then-No. 24 Pittsburgh — wins decided quarters in advance. Thorpe said those were a testament to SU’s backline, which has come in handy in later tight contests.
“Really proud of our defense,” Thorpe said. “They’ve been carrying us all year long.”
Syracuse hasn’t allowed double-digit scores since February. Besides North Carolina, no ACC squad concedes fewer goals than SU; its 7.3 scores allowed per game ranks fifth in the nation, and its 22% defensive efficiency mark, per Lacrosse Reference, ranks second.
Offensive inconsistencies explain Syracuse’s too-close-for-comfort victories. In March, the Orange escaped a three-game stretch with three wins despite averaging seven goals in the span. SU’s top-four ranking might signal it’d comfortably handle those below it. While it’s only lost to three top-10 teams, how Syracuse has compiled its 12 wins raises eyebrows. Many of its games are close because of struggles to convert down the stretch.
“We need to clean up some situational stuff,” Thorpe said. “We’re very fortunate in these close games where we’re sneaking out with them.”
It was no surprise then-No. 5 Yale challenged Syracuse when the Orange were the underdog in March. While SU never trailed, the contest was tied at five until Trinkaus gave Syracuse an advantage with nine minutes remaining. SU was held scoreless for almost 23 minutes, including the entire third quarter. Thorpe called out his team’s complacency afterward.
“We haven’t played a full 60 minutes,” Thorpe said. “We got to string together good quarters, good halves.
Eleven days later, Syracuse pummeled Pitt by nine goals, but Thorpe still said the performance was “about 45” minutes of what he was looking for instead of the full 60.
Zoey Grimes | Design Editor
Thorpe addresses complacency in every press conference, and after a two-score game against unranked UAlbany on March 24 — which wasn’t battle-tested in a weak America East Conference — he was worried.
“If we play like this against Cornell, (it) will be running the clock on us,” he said postgame.
While the Orange handled the Big Red a week later, the 10-8 result was too close for satisfaction. These unranked, nervy wins contradicted their 10-goal batterings of the Golden Bears and Hokies.
Against ACC opposition, the wafer-thin scores continued. At the end of the second quarter and beginning of the third at then-No. 20 Virginia, SU could’ve pulled away. Its defense was suffocating, but its offense was nonexistent, scoring one second-half goal in a narrow 6-5 win.
It was the same story at then-No. 18 Duke. With seven minutes remaining, Syracuse’s three-goal lead seemed to put the game out of reach. But the Blue Devils battled back to tie it at nine.
“Duke came flying in the second half and made a run, and we got a little frazzled,” Thorpe said. “Our kids showed really good poise and calmness and composure, and they’ve been in a lot of tight games. Sometimes under fire, you get used to tight games.”
Still, Emma Muchnick scored a game-winner with two minutes left to keep SU’s streak alive.
“We’ve done a lot of situational lacrosse, but we have a lot of situational lacrosse to clean up,” Thorpe added.
Syracuse needed multiple overtimes to defeat Notre Dame. Yet, the Orange remained upright on their continued high-wire act.
SU’s balance will be tested in its regular-season finale Thursday against its rival Boston College. The Eagles have had the Orange’s number recently, defeating them by three-plus goals in their last three meetings and by an absurd 15 scores last year.
After dodging repeated bullets in its 12-game run, Syracuse is positioned for a first-round bye and second-round home game in the NCAA Tournament. With the Orange’s plus-2.7 average scoring margin, there’s reason to be wary. But until a team blows SU off course, it’ll keep squeaking past opponents. The close games have prepared Syracuse as it heads toward the postseason.
“It’s been a lot of dogfights this year,” Thorpe said. “When you get into so many dog fights, you get immune to it.”
