Jim Boeheim on NCAA tourney chances after loss: 'It doesn't matter what I think'
BROOKLYN, N.Y. -- It doesn't matter what Jim Boeheim thinks.
That's what he said - twice actually - when asked after Syracuse's 62-57 ACC Tournament loss to Miami what his team's NCAA Tournament fate should be when the field of 68 is announced on Sunday.
Then the Orange head coach went on to say exactly what he thinks.
"Last year we had three good wins against a top team in the country, Texas A&M, Connecticut who was not ranked, and Duke was at about 18," Boeheim said. "This year we have three good wins, three teams in the top 10 when they beat them."
It's understandable if Boeheim would want to compare this team's credentials to last year's team, which turned a 19-12 regular season (9-9 ACC) record, opening game conference tourney loss and a No. 10 seed in the Midwest Regional into an improbable Final Four appearance.
But despite Syracuse's "good" wins over Virginia, Florida State and Duke, it had some not so good losses to three former Big East foes in Connecticut, Georgetown and St. John's early in the year and finished the regular season at 18-14 despite a slightly better conference record of 10-8, something that Boeheim argues should work in his team's favor.
"We are universally felt to be -- I think by everybody -- the number one conference in the country. We finished seventh, tied for seventh," he said. "Other conferences are talking about getting 60 percent of their teams in the tournament. If we're the best conference in the country, we should get more than 50 percent of teams in the tournament."
In his Bracket Watch column prior to Wednesday's game, FOX Sports' Stewart Mandel had Syracuse as one of his last four teams into the tournament with the caveat that the Orange might be in with one ACC tourney win and that he'd feel much better with two.
Instead, like every season since they joined the conference (except 2015, when they didn't participate), Syracuse is heading home from the ACC tournament after its first game, something for which they only have themselves to blame.
Boeheim can point to the challenges of playing in the ACC, note his team's "good wins" or compare this group favorably to the one that made an impressive run last year. But the best argument his team could have made that they deserve to be in the Big Dance instead of the NIT would have been making sure they were on the court for a rematch of last year's Final Four matchup against UNC.
"I think the committee, from what I've gathered through my years, is looking for teams that can win games in the tournament," Boeheim, who plans to retire after the 2017-18 season, said. "I think we can."
With a talented team led by junior guard Andrew White III and star sophomore forward Tyler Lydon, he's probably correct.
Whether they'll get the opportunity to do so is now solely in the hands of the committee. And it doesn't matter what Jim Boeheim thinks.
