2011 NCAA Tournament Round of 64 Previews, Odds, and Predictions: (3) Syracuse vs. (14) Indiana State

Syracuse Orange
Seed: 3
Record: 26-7
Conference: Big East

vs.

Indiana State Sycamores
Seed: 14
Record: 20-13
Conference: Missouri Valley

Date: Friday, March 18
Time: 9:57 pm Eastern
Location: Cleveland, OH 
Region: East

 

The Sycamores might need some help from the ghost of Larry Bird to compete with Syracuse.

Team Comparisons with SportsRatings Statistics

     Syracuse                              Indiana St.

Power Ratings

Strength:      #13 (#13 of 68)     Strength:      #116 (#58 of 68)
Neutral court: #9                  Neutral court: #115
Injuries Adj:  #12                 Injuries Adj:  #139

Tempo-free:    #13                 Tempo-free:    #114
Offense:       #19                 Offense:       #180
Defense:       #13                 Defense:       #73

Special Analyses

2nd half of season: #10            2nd half of season: #115
Last 6 games:       #4             Last 6 games:       #81 

Consistency:        #331           Consistency:        #210
Deep Run Potential: #19            Deep Run Potential: #120
Upset Potential:    #6             Upset Potential:    #108

 

Season overview: Syracuse (26-7)

• Wins vs. tournament teams (10): =Michigan+3, Michigan St.+14, Notre Dame+12, @St. John's+17, Cincinnati+15, @Connecticut+8, West Virginia+11, @Villanova+5, @Georgetown+7, @St. John's+6
• Losses to tournament teams (6): @Pittsburgh-8, Villanova-11, @Marquette-6, Georgetown-8, @Louisville-4, =Connecticut-OT
• Other losses (1): Seton Hall-22

Key Info: Syracuse rocketed to an 18-0 start but immediately fell into a pit, losing four straight in increasingly disturbing fashion. A meltdown appeared to be coming. But they busted out of that with a huge win over UConn, and later went on a six-game win streak including a 107-59 splattering of DePaul. This year they lost the (single) overtime game to UConn in the Big East tournament, but considering how bad it almost got in the middle, they finished the season well.

Kris Joseph leads in scoring (14.4 ppg) and Rick Jackson is huge on the boards (10.6 per game) but its Scoop Jackson that makes the team go, with 5.8 assists per game to go with his 12.8 points. Bustling with talent, the team has been undermined by inconsistency as we've seen. When they're bad, things go wrong, but when they're good, they're as good as anyone.

             **************************************************************
 

Season overview: Indiana St. (20-13)

• Wins vs. tournament teams (0): none
• Losses to tournament teams (3): @Notre Dame-9, =Purdue-13, Morehead St.-6
• Other losses (10): @Loyola Chicago-12, =Eastern Kentucky-OT, @Ball St.-15, @Wyoming-30, @Evansville-5, @Wichita St.-OT, Evansville-3, @Creighton-14, Wichita St.-16, @Missouri St.-7

Key Info: Indiana State isn't a bad team. They went 12-6 in the Missouri Valley, a conference that has been great in the past but is admittedly not up to par this season. They won the conference tournament with upsets of top teams Wichita State and Missouri State. That's the good. The bad is an 81-51 loss to Wyoming in game 8, and at least six other losses that even a 14-seed shouldn't suffer. And even at their best—the 5 game stretch at the end—they weren't overwhelming. Just decent.

Indiana State plays good defense, but their offense is going to have trouble against Syracuse's zone. They spread the scoring around, with no one over 11 ppg, but they aren't a particularly deadly 3-point shooting team. They're going to be sick of hearing people say it, but they need a Larry Bird.

             **************************************************************

Game Analysis: 14-seeds beating 3-seeds isn't all that rare at all. But this one doesn't look like a potential upset candidate.

Syracuse dominates in all categories and to boot, they're playing at a high level recently. If they were slipping at all at the end, we could give Indiana State a chance. Instead, even with Syracuse's larger than normal standard deviation, their lows don't stretch down far enough to make an upset a reasonable pick.

Vegas Line:

Syracuse by  11 1/2

Power rating spread

Syracuse by  13.9   
 

% Chance to win

Syracuse:     83% 
Indiana St.:  17% 

3-seeds win these games about 85% of the time, so Syracuse's 83% odds seems in line with that. The oddsmakers see a closer game than our power rating, but Syracuse could be all over the board so the difference isn't great.

Bottom line: If an upset happens here, no one really should claim that they saw it coming for anything other than a random hunch. It's true that Syracuse is vulnerable to being upset, but probably not at this round.

Final prediction: Syracuse 72, Indiana State 58