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CHESTNUT HILL, Mass. — After Jaeden Zackery’s 3-pointer bounced off the back of the rim, Quinten Post, positioned behind Cole Swider, lifted his feet off the ground and started to lean over the SU forward. Buddy Boeheim and Symir Torrence perched closer to the foul line, watching the sequence unfold with 7:40 left in the first half and Syracuse leading Boston College 19-9. And Jesse Edwards, the Orange’s center and rebounder who needed to counter Post, sat on the bench with two fouls.

So Post’s hands collapsed around the ball, and he carried it toward his body. It mirrored some of the countless other defensive rebounding lapses by SU throughout its 2021-22 season, the ones that helped create its current 303rd-ranked defensive rebounding percentage, according to KenPom. Then, over the last month, rebounding became a strength, and the Orange prevented opponents from controlling that category. But against the Eagles, Post bounced the ball twice, turned back to the basket and hit a short jumper over Frank Anselem.

“It hurts not having Jesse in there for sure,” Syracuse head coach Jim Boeheim said. “Their big guy just dominated Jesse completely. And Frank.”

It was one of 14 offensive rebounds and two of 40 points in the paint the Eagles managed against Syracuse in the Orange’s 73-64 win on Tuesday night inside Conte Forum. The struggles stemmed from Edwards’ foul trouble that emerged again and forced him out of the game with five fouls for the first time since Jan. 18 against Clemson. Post finished with 14 points and 14 rebounds, and he converted 7-of-13 shots he attempted around the basket.

As a result of Edwards’ foul trouble, Anselem played a career-high 23 minutes, committing enough miscues that showcased Syracuse’s season-long problems with center play and depth.

“It’s something that we obviously didn’t envision but when you’re missing 3s, they’re going to switch things up,” Swider said about BC’s approach in the paint. “And they did a good job switching things up and making it difficult for us.”

The Eagles shot 6-for-28 from beyond the arc, making just one shot in the opening half, and Boeheim said postgame that the Orange “cheated” a bit defensively on the perimeter to keep those 3s from falling. They wanted to make Brevin Galloway uncomfortable, he said, and they did, as he shot 1-of-12 from beyond the arc.

But when the openings for Boston College inside paired with two Edwards fouls in the first 11 minutes, it gave them a distinct advantage that Post had already started to exploit, even with Edwards in the game. He’d disrupted shots not by blocking them, but by using slight, natural contact to push the ball from SU’s center away from its intended target. And an offensive rebound, followed by a layup, sparked Boston College’s first field goal of the game with 14:02 remaining in that first half.

Edwards’ foul trouble and the interior defense woes had been patched over the last three weeks and had been virtually nonexistent as SU embarked on its three-game winning streak, but BC tore that temporary solution off.

The expanded minutes for Anselem presented an opportunity for Syracuse’s bench to contribute at a rate it hasn’t reached this year. After the Orange defeated Louisville on Saturday, Boeheim said that “we need those guys to play better when they get in.” That meant Torrence, Benny Williams, and, especially on Saturday, Anselem. Edwards has now fouled out in 11 games this season, but Anselem’s inconsistent play has caused Boeheim to incorporate a small lineup at times with Jimmy Boeheim at center.

“Frank’s done some good things, but you need to play well first of all in practice, and then when you do get six, seven, eight minutes, nine minutes in a game, you’ve got to try to accomplish something,” Boeheim said on Saturday. “Something.”

Anselem recorded a pair of offensive rebounds in the early minutes after he checked in when Edwards had two fouls, but he threw the second one away and drew a glare from Boeheim at the other end of the court. Around that same time, he gave up the offensive rebound and finish to Post, too. Boeheim said that he wants Anselem to learn, and understand the need, to jump for those rebounds, instead of staying close to the ground and letting the opponent gain better leverage.

But Anselem at times flashed the potential that Syracuse’s center position could be solved, or at least patched, when Edwards leaves the game due to fouls. He attempted to snare an offensive rebound with his right hand before scoping it up from the court moments later against BC, flushing it through the net for a two-handed dunk. Then, at the other end of the court, he helped force a travel to keep the Orange’s lead at 12 points.

“I thought Frank did a good job in there,” Boeheim said. “Hanging in there, battling.”

The Eagles still found a way to score the most points in the paint against the Orange since Virginia totaled 40 on Jan. 1. And to cut Syracuse’s lead to seven late in the half, Zackery raced up the court in transition after DeMarr Langford Jr. grabbed a defensive rebound, split between Edwards and Swider while drawing the fifth foul on Edwards and flipping the ball off the backboard and in at the same time.

That forced Edwards to the bench for good. SU then turned small, subbing in Torrence, and the final three served as the latest reminder for how thin the Orange’s defense is — especially with its starting lone reliable option at center missing.

Published on February 9, 2022 at 1:15 am

Contact Andrew: [email protected] | @CraneAndrew