It’ll be a tight sprint to the finish with just four ACC games left to go.
Similar to the men’s team, the Syracuse Orange women’s basketball team are pretty much out of the race to make the NCAA Tournament, barring any sort of miraculous run in the ACC Tournament.
That being said, there is still something to play for: making the conference tournament in the first place.
Syracuse sits just on the cusp of either making or missing this year’s ACC Tournament. As a reminder with the new 18-team “All-Coast Conference”, only the top-15 teams end up earning a trip to Greensboro.
With just a handful of games left in 2024-25, there’s a lot of different ways Syracuse’s season could end.
Syracuse currently sits with a 10-15 record overall with a 4-10 record against the ACC this year, falling most recently on Sunday to California. But, despite being six games below-.500 in conference record, Syracuse is still (barely) entering this final stretch on the inside track of making the conference tournament.
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Eight teams in the ACC sit with a conference record of 9-5 or better: Notre Dame (13-0), NC State (12-2), Duke (11-2), UNC and Louisville (11-3), Florida State (9-4) and Georgia Tech and California (9-5). After that, there’s another tier of four teams with an around .500 conference record: Virginia Tech (7-7), Clemson (6-9), Stanford (5-9) and Virginia (5-9).
And then, there’s the Orange, sitting No. 13 in the conference standings.
Again, with just four games left to go heading into the ACC Tournament, there’s a lot of mobility that can happen in either direction.
Syracuse sits just half a game ahead of Boston College who is at No. 14. Miami (FL) and Pittsburgh are each at 3-11 — essentially in the hunt for the final conference tournament spot — followed by SMU and last-place Wake Forest.
In the most realistic of universes out there, Syracuse is unlikely to crack the top-nine in the conference and escape having to play that First Round in the ACC Tournament. That would require Syracuse to go 3-1 down the stretch and for Virginia Tech to drop a few more games than expected.
The real question is does Syracuse even get to play in the conference tournament in the first place.
The case for Syracuse: two of the final four games in the year are against Pittsburgh and Boston College, both of which are at home. The Orange have one less conference loss than BC, while Pitt is a full game behind Syracuse in the standings. It’s essentially a case where Syracuse controls its own destiny: if it handles business against both those teams, it’s hard to see the Orange not get in.
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On the flip side, the other two games left on the Orange’s schedule is a home game versus No. 12 UNC followed by a road matchup against No. 13 Duke. Both of those opponents sit third and tied for fourth in the conference standings with a combined five losses against the ACC. Each also currently have win streaks heading into this week’s action.
If Syracuse can go 3-1 in this stretch (beating Pitt plus BC and upsetting one of UNC or Duke), the team is entering No. 10 to No. 12 seed territory in the ACC Tournament. If Syracuse drops both North Carolina opponents, again, there’s not a lot of room for error.
Something else to monitor is the current bottom of the ACC barrel: BC, Miami, Pitt and SMU, all of which are in the hunt with Syracuse for those last few spots:
- BC: home versus SMU, home versus Virginia Tech, away versus Syracuse
- Miami: home versus Notre Dame, home versus Wake Forest, away versus Stanford, away versus California
- Pitt: away versus Florida State, home versus Clemson, away versus Syracuse, away versus Wake Forest
- SMU: away versus Wake Forest, away versus Boston College, home versus Virginia, home versus NC State
Among these teams, Pitt faces a similar situation as Syracuse: two games it is likely favored in paired with two tougher opponents. SMU is likely the “don’t count us out yet” team with three straight games against opponents sitting at 5-9 or worse in the conference. Miami faces the toughest climb playing No. 2 Notre Dame and having the late season trip to the West Coast, while BC could jump a spot winning at least two of its last three.
In short, Syracuse will indeed have something to still play for down the stretch and every game will count from here until the beginning of March.