Syracuse off to the ACC
Neither Syracuse or Pittsburgh are on the coast, but the Atlantic Coast Conference now really stretches the length of the Atlantic with the addition of the Orange and the Panthers. For Syracuse the move was a necessity for football and not a bad deal for the basketball program either.
The Syracuse tradition in both men’s basketball and football is very deep. Coach Jim Boeheim has made some regional rivalries in the Big East, but the ACC offers plenty of regional flavor to excite the fan base and some trips to the state of North Carolina that will develop into huge rivalries over the years. Regionally speaking, Syracuse has Pitt, Maryland and Boston College. The Eagles have been the odd man out of the ACC since the conference made their first foray into the ranks of the Big East and plucked away BC and Virginia Tech. Now the Eagles have some old regional rivals back in the mix. That should help the talk in New England turn from the Big East to the ACC.
Syracuse may not view Boston College as a major rival on the hardwood in the near future, but it will be a renewed game from the “old” Big East. While the old rivals will be fun to play again, it is the new opposition that will be exciting for a while. The Orange may lose Connecticut, but they gain Duke and North Carolina. As far as traditionally stable programs go, you cannot get any better than Duke and North Carolina. The ACC obviously went after programs with a storied history in both sports. That is something Uconn lacks and why they are, at least for now, stuck in the Big East.
With the Orange, the ACC have Jim Brown and Gerry McNamara. They have Donovan McNabb and Carmelo Anthony. Duke and North Carolina cannot match that in multiple sports. Certainly the football program has some more rebuilding to do, but the basketball team and Coach Boeheim will compete for ACC titles as soon as they start playing in the conference.
Read the in-depth men’s basketball preview for this team
