NEW YORK — Syracuse will have to adjust to the traveling conditions as they enter a new conference in the 2013-14 season, West Virginia football players said during the Pinstripe Bowl media day earlier this week.
The Mountaineers left the Big East last season and have a full season of experiences in the Big 12. The results were mixed, as West Virginia went 4-5 in conference play, 7-5 overall. But with experience comes wisdom, and Mountaineer wide receivers Stedman Bailey and Tavon Austin offered their prospective on the transition year.
“The number one thing as far as me was traveling,” Austin said. “Just back-to-back games in Texas to be flying three hours and coming right back, waiting, boarding up and flying another three hours in a different type of climate. We’re not used to Texas weather or humid it was. There was definitely a difference.”
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While the ACC-bound Orange won’t have to travel to Texas for a conference game, Syracuse will be taking many more trips down south instead of staying in the familiar confines of the northeast. SU will be reacquainting themselves with Virginia Tech, Miami and Boston College, but they will also be adding new locations such as Clemson, Florida State and Georgia Tech.
“It definitely will be a whole lot of new traveling going on,” Bailey said. “You definitely have to go to a couple of new locations. Those were some of the new things we experienced this year. We actually had to go to the middle coast and to adjust to different time zones and different things like that, I’m quite sure Syracuse will have to adjust to the many different things that come along with being in a new conference.”
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Still, the adjustment hasn’t necessarily been a bad thing for the Mountaineers. And maybe, it won’t be bad for the Orange, either.
“If anything, it was a pretty good experience for me being able to go into a bunch of different states and new cities and play new teams,” Bailey said. “It was good to see some different things. I wouldn’t say it made anything any harder. You just have to adjust to conditions, like in Texas, it was kind of hot, but that’s about it.”
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