Ahead of the 2018-19 season, The Daily Orange sat down with SU head coach Jim Boeheim to discuss the upcoming campaign, his personnel and the new college basketball rules. Boeheim enters his 43rd season at the helm of his alma mater. The Orange, who have held practice for the past two weeks, tip off the season Nov. 6 against Eastern Washington in the Carrier Dome.

Here are a few highlights from the conversation.

Eric Devendorf’s position probably won’t be filled

On Sept. 6, Eric Devendorf announced he left Syracuse to be special assistant to head coach Mike Davis at Detroit Mercy. Devendorf had rejoined the Orange in 2016 as assistant strength coach after playing for  Syracuse from 2005-09: He ranks 14th on the school’s all-time scoring list, with 1,680 points, and he averaged 14.5 points across 116 career games.

Aside from his strength responsibilities, Devendorf offered players tips and was “like a big brother,” senior point guard Frank Howard said at the end of last season.

“We won’t probably fill that,” Boeheim said of Devendorf’s position. “We had that role to help him get started in coaching. He was good to be around the players, his attitude, personality. We’ve got really good young coaches who are really good at what they do.”

Boeheim said he wishes, like several other Division I coaches, that the NCAA had passed a rule allowing for lower-level staff members — such as the director of operations or strength coaches — to conduct on-court drills. As the rule currently stands, Syracuse’s director of operations Kip Wellman is not allowed to be involved in practice.

“It would have been good if they had passed that rule,” Boeheim said. “I would have gotten more money for Eric if we had passed that rule, where he could have gone on the court. They should have passed that rule. I don’t know why they didn’t.

“I think they’ll pass that rule eventually, so that those guys can get on the court. Kip would be able to. It would be two guys. Generally the operations guys, could be the strength guy.”

Boeheim hopes the rule will be passed because it would, more than anything, allow staff members like Wellman or Devendorf to gain more on-court experience. Wellman wants to be a coach someday. With on-court experience, Wellman would have a more attractive resume, should he apply for a full-time assistant job, Boeheim said.

“That would help him get a job,” Boeheim said. “That’s the beauty of being on the court.”

The new NCAA rules may not be all that effective

In August, a set of new rules set out to give more freedom to athletes. The NCAA Board of Governors released the array of new rules in response to the recommendations of the Commission on College Basketball, or “Rice Commission” — which spawned from the 2017 FBI investigation into corruption in college hoops, to investigate the causes of the corruption and offer recommendations to fix it.

Boeheim responded to the new rules with a focus on the NBA Draft front. The new rules allow players to stay in the draft, and if they aren’t picked, return to school.

“These things are all good intentions,” Boeheim said. “There were five guys who didn’t get drafted last year. They were not coming back. They’d already signed, sealed, gone. They’re not going to come back. The only thing they could do, they have to be in the combine. With this new rule, anyone could go to the combine. Why wouldn’t Marek (Dolezaj) and all these guys go ahead? You have 10 guys and five of them might not come back in June or July? What are you going to do then?

“You do have to make the combine, so it limits that somewhat,” Boeheim added. “Still, I don’t think those guys would come back. So not sure the rule will do much.”

As for the current one-and-done rule, Boeheim has repeatedly spoken against it. He believes “it would be good if (players) can stay in college for three years, but that will never happen. It would help everybody. Teams would be better. It would help the players develop.”

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Early impressions of the lineup

When asked about Syracuse sophomore forward Oshae Brissett, Boeheim did not indicate how the freshman star from a season ago had improved this offseason.

“I haven’t seen him,” Boeheim said. “He hasn’t worked out, so we’ll see what happens when he’s back at practice.”

Freshman guard Jalen Carey is efficient with the ball, Boeheim said, and the returning guards Oshae Brissett and Frank Howard will be “as important this year as they were last year.”

Transfer Elijah Hughes should provide depth and offense at the forward position, Boeheim said. Hughes can shoot and pose as a 6-foot-6 matchup nightmare, especially in tandem with sophomore forwards Marek Dolezaj and Brissett. Boeheim also said sophomore forward Bourama Sidibe “wasn’t healthy last year. We think he’ll be healthy. Paschal (Chukwu) is healthier. He was not 100 percent last year.”

Lessen the expectation

Boeheim’s message to fans: Don’t get overly excited. Yes, Syracuse returns all five starters and could earn a Top 25 ranking early in the season. But SU’s offense struggled throughout the 2017-18 season, and Boeheim doesn’t equate returning starters with success.

“Everybody has to get better, otherwise we won’t win many games this year, because we didn’t win many last year,” Boeheim said. “Everybody on our team has to get better. The fact that we have everybody coming back doesn’t matter if they’re the same players as they were last year, because we didn’t win many games last year. We weren’t very good. We played good at the end, but that’s just part of the season. We were not good during the regular season last year.

“If we improve, we have a chance to be a better team,” he added. “That’s still a question mark.”

Jim and Juli Boeheim will divide their children’s games

For years, Boeheim and his wife of 21 years, Juli, could watch many of their children’s games. The kids attended Jamesville-DeWitt High School.

This season, three of Boeheim’s children will play college hoops: his daughter, Jamie, at the University of Rochester; older son, Jimmy, at Cornell; and younger son, Buddy, for Syracuse. Last season, Jim and Juli made a few trips to see Jimmy’s Cornell games. They routinely met for dinner on Sunday evenings in Ithaca.

But this year, it may be slightly more challenging to see as many games.

“Jimmy plays Fridays and Saturdays, so Juli or I will try to get down there to see him when we can,” Boeheim said. “Sissy (Jamie Rochester) will play Friday and Sunday, so we’ll see her Sunday games as much as we can.”

Published on October 8, 2018 at 9:59 pm

Contact Matthew: [email protected] | @MatthewGut21