Bracketology: Will Syracuse’s hot run result in an NCAA Tournament bid?

The ACC is struggling to find teams worthy at-large bids to the NCAA Tournament, which could open the door for Syracuse, who is heating up.

Every league in America is prone to the occasional down year, and this time it is the ACC’s turn to fall from glory. Entering the weekend’s action, ESPN’s Joe Lunardi projects only four ACC teams will make the NCAA Tournament, with one of those teams (NC State) stuck in a First Four game.

That bid total is lowest among the Power 5 leagues, but logic suggests the Big Ten will cannibalize itself enough that it won’t send 12 of its 14 members to the dance. That should open up at least one more spot for the ACC, and at the moment one of the best candidates to take it is Syracuse.

The Orange set themselves up poorly for conference play with a tough run out of the league, although losses to Penn State and Iowa have aged much better with the Big Ten’s supremacy. ACC play also wasn’t too kind to Syracuse to start, which began the year 1-3 in league play, but the Orange have recovered nicely by going 5-1 in their next six games.

Over that stretch, which included a five-game winning streak, Syracuse avenged losses to Notre Dame as well as fellow bubblers Virginia and Virginia Tech. All three of those victories came on the road, which will be a significant boost to the Orange’s resume since road wins count higher in the quadrant based system the NCAA selection committee uses to evaluate tournament teams.

The lone defeat came earlier in the week, with the Orange losing by just a point at Clemson, which isn’t shameful since the Tigers have a home win over Duke on their ledger. Syracuse figures to improve even further in ACC play thanks to the uniqueness of their 2-3 zone, which is highly unusual in college basketball and very difficult to prepare for on a given night.

The Orange also have a bona fide star in junior forward Elijah Hughes, who leads the team in scoring (19.3 points per game) and assists (4.1 per night) while chipping in 5.2 rebounds a game as well. Hughes hasn’t scored less than 10 points in a game this season, making him a reliable scorer to take the pressure off of the rest of the rotation.

The issue Syracuse is going to run into in their attempt to snag a bubble bid is they already have eight losses, and accumulating losses in a down league is not an ideal strategy to secure a ticket to dance. There are four tremendous opportunities for Syracuse to improve its resume remaining, beginning Saturday night against Duke and a critical three-game stretch beginning Feb. 11 featuring a home date with NC State and a two-game road swing to Florida State and Louisville.

It feels like the NC State game is a must-win for Syracuse, and they probably have to get one of the other three wins to provide a signature victory for the committee to look at. The rest of the schedule will be avoiding bad losses, a task that will be tricky with road games against Pittsburgh, Miami, and Boston College still looming.

Those are truly no-win scenarios for Syracuse, which gains next-to-nothing by winning them and loses a ton by dropping those games. Taking care of business, along with securing a marquee win or two could set the Orange up well to get a bye in the ACC Tournament, which would set them up with an opportunity to get another statement win late in the year.

The tools are all there for Jim Boeheim‘s squad, it is just a matter of putting the pieces together.

Syracuse does have an opportunity to sneak into an at-large bid, but their so-so start to the season has provided little margin for error.