Syracuse loses 4th straight with 41-16 defeat to No. 7 Georgia Tech
After falling to No. 7 Georgia Tech Saturday, Syracuse must win three of its final four games to clinch a fourth straight Bowl appearance. Courtesy of Scott Schild | syracuse.com
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ATLANTA — Fran Brown said Syracuse would find out this week what it’s learned amid a season-worst three-game skid. The Orange are reeling. A road matchup with No. 7 Georgia Tech — its highest-ranked opponent under Brown — would only test SU further.
“This is when you find out who’s a real football coach and who isn’t,” Brown said Monday. “How the team responds, how the team continues to play… This is life. This is my life.”
Brown and the Orange still have plenty of figuring out to do.
Syracuse (3-5, 1-4 Atlantic Coast) fell to No. 7 Georgia Tech (8-0, 5-0 Atlantic Coast) 41-16 Saturday, continuing a monumental spiral and shrinking its Bowl hopes further. Despite a strong start, the Orange allowed 20 unanswered points as SU quarterback Rickie Collins went 17-for-29 with a touchdown and one turnover. Haynes King continued his star-studded season with five touchdowns on 81% passing, as GT totaled over 500 yards.
Postgame, Brown said he’d have to watch the tape to really know what he learned. What he undoubtedly knows is that the Orange must be near perfect the rest of the year if they hope to clinch a fourth-straight Bowl appearance.
“In life, there’s a lot of work,” Brown said postgame. “You keep going, and you don’t get to be successful without working hard.”
Syracuse initially held its ground. Then the Yellow Jackets proved why they’re a top-10 squad while SU showed why it hasn’t won in a month.
King and GT’s offense started with the ball, but cornerback Chris Peal stripped Isiah Canon on the second play of the game. Yasin Willis took Syracuse’s first offensive snap 41 yards down to the Georgia Tech one-yard line. SU then resumed its disastrous offensive trend with a mix of false starts and negative plays, settling for a field goal for its first lead since its win over Clemson on Sept. 20.
“We can’t have that,” Collins said of the continuous penalties. “Any football team, you can’t have that. It kills the momentum.”
King came back out and accelerated. In GT’s 7-0 start, its best since the 1960s, he ranked first among ACC quarterbacks and fifth in the country in rushing yards with 560. Yet he’s still efficient through the air with a 70.6% completion rate. He began the game 7-for-7 before a drop on a wide-open touchdown from tight end Josh Beetham. The Orange then forced a field goal, knotting the game at 3-3.
Syracuse safety Devin Grant said Tuesday that its defense would have a “piranha mentality” to slow King. While GT shot itself in the foot multiple times with penalties, SU did slow the Yellow Jackets to just three points in the first quarter.
Though, as the Orange’s offense couldn’t get going under Collins — just like their last three games — more pressure went to the defense. Eventually, they cracked. Minutes into the second quarter, SU took out Grant on a fourth-and-1 just seconds before the snap. King found a wide-open Beetham, who secured it this time for a score.
GT nearly duplicated its lead a few minutes later through the same combination, pushing the advantage to 17-3 after the extra point. SU then mishandled a fourth-and-1, and the Yellow Jackets then drove the length of the field in under a minute for a last-second field goal. In the blink of an eye, Georgia Tech led 20-3 at the half.
Brown compared SU’s recent slide to a Power Ranger or Transformer. The head, of course, Steve Angeli, is down. The Orange must work together to figure out how to get a win. For a split second, it looked like they did.
SU jumped out of the halftime break on fire, instantly hitting Johntay Cook II for 41 yards before a 34-yard touchdown to Darrell Gill Jr. Collins had only 24 passing yards in the first half. His numbers instantly jumped as the Orange cut the deficit.
Just as Syracuse seemed to find some momentum, the Yellow Jackets answered right back with a sting of their own. Georgia Tech’s run-pass option burned the Orange, and this time it was Dean Patterson from 37 yards out — King’s third touchdown, as his completion percentage climbed over 80%.
SU’s only option in the end was to hail the King. The sixth-year quarterback grew GT’s lead to 24 with another touchdown midway through the third quarter, this one coming with his legs. The Orange would never recover. They wouldn’t even come close.
Escaping a rut to the extent Syracuse currently finds itself in doesn’t have a clear solution. Collins said Brown’s message to the team postgame was simply not to turn on each other.
“We’re gonna attack the rest of the season like we still have an opportunity to win a championship,” Collins said. “We just have to continue to build this program and grow this culture.”
The standard remains high. SU isn’t yet eliminated from Bowl contention. It needs three wins in its last four games with powerhouses No. 9 Miami and No. 12 Notre Dame still on the schedule.
The signs are there of turning the page to the future.
The Orange mixed in true freshmen like Tylik Hill, Darius “Boobie” Johnson and Byron Washington, among others, on offense notably more than in the past. On defense, 13 of the 23 SU players who recorded a tackle are underclassmen.
“We’ll stay up and positive and keep working,” Brown said. “They know it’s a bright future ahead of us.”
Inside a makeshift visiting press conference setup, built along the perimeter of a weight room, Brown walked off in his black Syracuse crewneck, khaki pants and black Jordan 4s following a fourth-straight loss.
Just a year ago, Brown pressed all the right buttons to turn the Orange into a 10-win team in his first year at the helm. Now, a sudden change of fortunes has shifted Syracuse back into the limelight, stuck in a season of mediocrity.
