College Basketball

Syracuse begins to feel buzz of historic undefeated run

SYRACUSE — The Carrier Dome was calling.

Playing at St. Benedict’s Prep in Newark, promising point guard Tyler Ennis would bus back home to Toronto, a half-day journey which included more stops than he ever could understand.

Before he could begin imagining a life where he leads the top-ranked team in the nation to a 22-0 record — the best start in Syracuse’s storied history — he would anticipate the moment of reprieve in the 12-hour slog, the sight of the massive arena amid the rural monotony of upstate New York.

The ride never changed.

A combination of roads running north and west, hook left and right like bad golf shots past scenery that’s sweet and serene, but slightly stagnant — a continuous loop of snow, trees and concrete overpasses that look like a cheap animation trick.

The speed limit increases, but doesn’t make the journey feel any quicker. Each mile is another mile further from familiar, making the unknown locations along the way — Homer, Preble, Tully, Nedrow — seem a little more remote.

Halfway through the trip, tedium would momentarily cede to imagination, as the past and potential future collided.

Staring out the window from Interstate 81, the Carrier Dome would appear, eliciting excitement and awe from Ennis, instantly taking him back to an AAU tournament on Syracuse’s home court. Even as an 11-year-old, the biggest on-campus court in college basketball wasn’t overwhelming.

“It was the first university I’d seen and I just loved the whole atmosphere in the dome,” Ennis recalled. “I kind of set it in my mind that I was going to come here and I was going to work to get into that position.”

Tyler Ennis dribbles the ball past Quinn Cook of the Duke Blue Devils on Feb. 1 2014. Syracuse defeated Duke 91-89 in overtime.Rich Barnes/Getty Images

Ennis arrived on campus after the departure of Michael Carter-Williams, immediately slotted for workhorse minutes as Syracuse’s freshman starting point guard.

He said he never felt like a freshman, even in his first game. He hasn’t played like one either. He entered the weekend leading the Atlantic Coast Conference in assists (5.7) and steals (2.36) while ranking second in the nation in assist-to-turnover ratio (3.94:1) — with no turnovers in the final five minutes of any game.

“I didn’t see it coming,” senior C.J. Fair said, a common refrain among the team. “I knew he was good, but I didn’t know he’d be this good. He plays calm. He doesn’t get sped up by anybody. That’s one thing you don’t see a lot, especially in young players. He sees plays develop before they happen. You can’t teach that.

“He’s just been playing great and [has] been great as far as running the team.”

The team was going to be good, but there were question marks after losing Carter-Williams, Brandon Triche and James Southerland from last year’s Final Four squad.

Trevor Cooney has taken on 20 minutes more than last season (31.6) and is hitting more than 57 percent of the Orange’s 3-pointers as the second-leading scorer (14.1). Jerami Grant — the son of former NBA forward Harvey Grant — no longer just jumps out of buildings, now scoring (12.8) nearly 10 more points per game than last season.

And after three seasons in a supporting role, Fair decided to return for one more year, wanting to become the go-to guy for the first time since high school.

“He’s playing the best of anyone in the conference,” 38-year coach Jim Boeheim said. “You can’t play much better than that. … He’s our best player. Tyler’s made some great plays at the end of games, but the reason he’s been able to is because C.J. got us there.”

Fair was fantastic, scoring 28 points in 45 minutes in the incredible overtime win over Duke at the Dome last Saturday, but even record-setting crowds eventually quiet.

It is Thursday. It is five days past the most anticipated on-campus game memory can conjure.

Despite the initial revulsion of their basketball school being dragged into the ACC because of football, the stages of post-Big East grief are over.

The on-campus book store still is littered with “Beat Duke” shirts, the same displayed in a tweet from Vice President Biden. The book store, one employee said, did $51,000 more merchandise sales than a normal Saturday for last week’s epic clash.

“People were more excited for the Duke game than any game we ever played. Whether they should’ve been or not, I don’t know, but we sold more tickets than we’ve ever sold,” Boeheim said. “The fans adjust quickly.”

The fans have surprised the team with impressive turnouts at new conference foes like Wake Forest and Miami, the orange as ubiquitous as in the local restaurants and bars and stores decorated with posters and stickers and signs.

Outside, orange only appears in blips. It is 18 degrees and feels like 8. Common sense prevails, with layers overtaking orange, but the cold doesn’t wedge its way into conversations any more than the existence of gravity. It is the world they live in.

It hasn’t snowed in nearly 24 hours, but plows continue clearing paths one day after the school’s second snow-caused closing in 21 years — an impressive feat bested by Boeheim’s casual boast that snow never has cancelled one of his practices.

The Carrier Dome, seen so clearly from the highway, can appear from out of nowhere on campus. It is big, but not tremendously taller than the surrounding buildings. Through a quad, the bubble roof appears over the Physics Building, blending in with the white all around, the concrete exterior no more distinctive than that of a rest stop.

Students walk past the arena without giving it a glance, the way native New Yorkers feel no need to arch their necks in midtown Manhattan.

Syracuse fans cheer while waving cutouts of players Tyler Ennis, left, and C.J. Fair, right, in the second half against Pittsburgh on Jan. 18. Syracuse won 59-54.AP Photo/Nick Lisi

A 22-0 record is special, but nothing feels new. Excellence is expected. Undefeated isn’t even novel. In the past three seasons, the Orange opened the seasons 10-0, 20-0 and 18-0.

“There’s a lot of excitement on campus, but this isn’t the first time we’ve had the top-ranked team in the country,” senior Michael Rice said. “Though, this is probably the most complete team we’ve had.”

That’s debatable, especially after following two of the most talented teams in school history.

The record is perfect, the play is not. In becoming one of 24 teams to enter February without a loss since Indiana’s 1976 championship team completed the last flawless season in college basketball, Syracuse has won six games by six points or less.

Early in the season, Ennis said Boeheim would tell the team they weren’t even good, particularly after a season-opening halftime deficit at home against Cornell — a team without a Division I win this season. The coach estimates they could have lost seven or eight games, and he knows the toughest still remain — five of the nine remaining regular-season games are on the road, against ranked opponents such as Pittsburgh, Duke and Virginia.

Predictably, the players aren’t concerned with anything more than winning their next game, though the byproduct of that eventually could make undefeated an unavoidable thought.

“It’s not something we talk about,” Cooney said. “We want to win every game. You want to win so bad that you don’t see yourself losing.”

Surprisingly, the fans aren’t talking about it much either. The high improbability is more palpable than the historic possibility.

“It’d be amazing. We all want it to happen, but that’s going to be tough,” said sophomore Jen Hubert, a Massachusetts native who grew up only knowing the school from NCAA Tournament brackets. “Nobody’s saying anything because nobody wants to jinx it.”

It is Friday, two days before the Orange’s next test — against Clemson. Practice is loose. The tight-knit group — which spends much of their time together playing video games, seeing movies and going to the mall — is sharing lots of laughs.

Boeheim’s demeanor is calm, like his freshman point guard in the final minutes.

In games, the coach still calls most plays. His voice is steady, instruction without intensity.

And then, multiple attempts at a backdoor lob fail. With each miss, he grows a little more agitated, his voice a little bit louder.

“This is so simple and you’re making it so hard,” Boeheim barks. “This isn’t hard.”

Belated success comes one play later.

Six days a week, the team continues building, hoping to claim a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament, which would unfurl a red carpet of de facto home games around New York, leading to the Final Four. The opening rounds likely would be in Buffalo, with potential Sweet 16 and Elite Eight games at Madison Square Garden — a building so renowned for orange occupation that Fair’s Maryland-based family initially believed it was in the city where he would be playing his four years.

The players know the path, dabbling in the hypothetical scenario before snapping back to the reality of what’s required to make it there.

“We’re nowhere close to where we want to be, and that’s another Final Four, and hopefully a championship,” Ennis said at the Carmelo K. Anthony Practice Center. “[Boeheim] told us that being undefeated means nothing. We need to be playing our best in the tournament.”

In a few months, the 6-foot-2 Ennis could be a lottery pick in the NBA Draft, but a few months ago, he could go mostly unrecognized at the local mall, flanked by taller teammates — Grant and Rakeem Christmas — who would draw instant crowds.

Anonymity is no longer an option. The Dome is packed by 35,000-plus, with at least one Ennis family member at every game — among his parents, extended family and five siblings, which includes his older brother, Dylan, who plays at Villanova.

Ennis has appeared in just 22 games, but fans already are wondering how fleeting the opportunity is to be able walk to see one of the country’s best play on their campus. Like Anthony, who left after leading the school to its only national championship in 2003, one season may be his collegiate career.

“He’s a little too good. I’m nervous he’s going to leave,” Rice said. “I can’t complain, but I’m fearing he’s gonna jump to the NBA. … Losing Carter-Williams was big, but he stepped in and he’s been even better.”

One and done. … It could be worth it. It was once before.