The Syracuse bench rose to its feet as Rick Jackson strolled off the court for the final time Saturday. Their leader was the last of SU’s starters to join them on the bench after what had arguably been the Orange’s most dominant victory in years.

Having already built a 55-point lead, Syracuse sat its starters for the remaining 9:33.

By the time Jackson retired to the bench, most of 20,247 in attendance had already begun to hit the exits.

‘When we stick to our coaching, play the right way and take the right shots, we can be a pretty good team,’ SU point guard Scoop Jardine said. ‘Nobody in the country can beat us when we play the right way. But we’ve shown that when we play the wrong way, we can be beaten as we almost lost a couple game this season.’

When it was all over, the Orange (10-0) rolled to a decisive 100-43 victory over Colgate (0-8). The Orange just missed setting a Carrier Dome record for scoring defense, which was set on Dec. 10, 2005 against Colgate. The Orange only allowed 35 points in that contest.

Despite an unbeaten mark through ten games, the victory Saturday was the first time the Orange dominated a game from start to finish. Fresh off it most impressive win of the season — a 72-58 win over No. 7 Michigan State in New York City Tuesday — Syracuse absolutely annihilated its little brother from just down the road, culminating in SU’s widest margin of victory at the Carrier Dome since 2004, when it defeated Northern Colorado 101-54.

‘We’ve been ready to come out and play every game,’ Boeheim said. ‘We just haven’t shot it as well. Tonight, we made shots and they didn’t and when that happens, it gets out of hand.

‘Everything went in for us and the bounces went out way. Nothing went right for (Colgate).’

The Orange scored the first 12 points of the game and never looked back. Only allowed eight first half points and won by 57 both records for the Orange under Boeheim.

And on offense, the Orange finally began to find the perfect balance between transition baskets and those from beyond the arc. SU was 7-for-14 from downtown in the first half , and finished the game 11-for-25 (44 percent), after shooting just 29 percent from long range coming into the game.

SU also outscored Colgate, 31-2, in transition points and held a 27-9 advantage off turnovers. All that, even while playing an unfamiliar man-to-man defense for nearly 30 minutes of the game.

‘Our defense speaks for itself,’ Joseph said. ‘We played great ‘D’ and that led to easy baskets in transition, so our defense was key for us tonight.’

James Southerland and Mookie Jones, both of whom didn’t play against the Spartans Tuesday, saw increased action. The two combined for 16 points in 39 minutes of action. After the game, Boeheim said this was a good opportunity for them to get some minutes, as the Orange might need them down the road.

Aside from those two, Syracuse played all 17 players on its roster and no starter played more than 25 minutes.

‘This was a fun game,’ Jackson said. ‘Just to get some of the guys involved that haven’t played much. These guys are working hard in practice keeping us starters on our toes. It was just good for them to get in there and get some solid minutes.’

But once again, it was its defense that opened things up for the Orange. Not only did the constant pressure keep Colgate from scoring, but it lead to a bevy of dunks in transition, keeping the crowd heavily involved despite the fact that the game was never really in doubt.

‘I think it has been very hard the first part of the season,’ Boeheim said. ‘Very hard every night, and we’ve had to grind it out. I think it’s good to get this.’

Coming off the impressive victory over Michigan State Tuesday, a blowout like this only adds to the momentum the Orange has going right now. It may have been understandable to come out flat after such a big win earlier in the week. Instead, SU just keeps working out the kinks from its first eight games.

‘Right now, everybody is just playing well,’ Jackson said. ‘There are always certain things that you can work on but right now as a team we’re playing great basketball.’

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Published on December 10, 2010 at 12:00 pm