Now in his sixth decade of covering SU sports, Brad was sports director of WSYR radio for eight years into the early 1990s, then wrote the Orange Watch column for The Big Orange/The Juice print publication for 18 years. A Syracuse University graduate, Brad currently runs his own media consulting business in the Philadelphia suburbs. Follow him on Twitter @BradBierman.
So the bar has been set in terms of Boeheim’s reaction to what those outside of the Melo Center are saying about a program that’s now a two-time offender in the eyes of the NCAA.
Philadelphia, for example, is known as a professional sports town with only a sprinkle of interest in Penn State and Rutgers football (Big Ten) and Big Five basketball, and as such creates a huge void in the northeast TV map.
The 2015 Syracuse football team will play at home the entire month of September, the first time the program has had the first four games played in Syracuse since 1935.
With an unusually long eight day, mid-season layoff until Virginia Tech comes into the Dome Feb. 3, it will be back to the business at hand which for this gritty and determined, if not undermanned, team.
In the race for as many conference victories as possible before the heavy back-end of the schedule features five of the final seven games against teams currently ranked in the Top 10, anything but a win over BC Tuesday would in of itself be enough to keep any Orange fan up at night.
Syracuse forward Chris McCullough will miss the remainder of the season after being diagnosed with a torn anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) in his right knee.
We guess the ACC office figured if it gives Syracuse a rotating home and home series with Duke for a second straight year, the least it can do is also give SU a home and home set with Virginia Tech as well to balance the Orange’s league slate.