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Dazed and confused, Florida State head coach Luke Loucks didn’t understand how everybody on Syracuse got so open all game. FSU’s 2-3 zone defense Tuesday was an embarrassment to Jim Boeheim’s famed set. The Orange ran, shot and passed circles around it en route to a season-high 94 points. In fact, they set season-highs in nearly every offensive category.

As the 35-year-old Loucks pondered the question — how did everybody get so open? — he bore a slight smirk, likely because he’d realized the answer long ago.

There was none.

“I’m still asking myself the same thing,” he said.

Syracuse’s ball movement, which has been an issue this season, overwhelmed Loucks and his Seminoles. SU averages the 14th-most assists per game in the Atlantic Coast Conference with 13.6, quite a low figure for a team with Naithan George at the 1, who has Donnie Freeman and William Kyle to feed inside. But against Florida State (7-10, 0-4 ACC), everything clicked for Syracuse (12-5, 3-1 ACC), whose crisp ball movement broke FSU’s zone to carry its offense in a 94-86 victory Tuesday at the Dome.

SU tallied a season-best 22 assists a game after setting its previous season-high against a Power Four team (17, at Pittsburgh). George led the way with a season-best 13, a valiant follow-up from the transfer point guard’s 11-assist day against Pitt.

It wasn’t merely about the assists; it was about Syracuse’s diverse scoring attack to break the zone. Tyler Betsey added 18 points off the bench and racked up six 3-point makes, a key cog for Syracuse.

Through solid schematic execution and three-level scoring, the Orange showed you better leave zones in high school ball when you prepare to face them.

“We really moved the ball and got the ball into the right places that it needed to be,” SU head coach Adrian Autry said postgame.

George credited his teammates for constantly being open for him as he dished to them all evening. However, with the way Syracuse has performed on offense as of late, combatting the Orange with a 2-3 zone was a puzzling choice that they took great advantage of.

Over the last three games, SU’s offense went away from its boring tendencies that had plagued it for the entire time Freeman was out with a right foot injury. Those nine contests without Freeman were rough. A flavorless offense usually based around a high screen and roll or a dribble hand off. Movement was lacking.

Now, with Freeman’s spacing improvements, Syracuse has turned a new leaf. It’s moving the ball at a rapid pace in half-court sets and moving well off the ball, too, with the offense emphasizing finding open shooters from beyond the arc and feeding Freeman — who dropped 25 points against FSU — down low. Those are two areas Autry said SU would center its scheme around. He’s kept his word.

And it’s working. Syracuse shot a vicious 60% from the field. It also drained a season-best 11 3-pointers. All night long, SU baited Florida State to trap the corners or the top of the key with its 2-3 zone. The Orange often responded by rapidly swinging the ball to Betsey, who shot an unconscious 75% from 3-point range on eight attempts for a season-high scoring night.

“I just try to be in the right spot, and good things are going to happen,” Betsey said.

That was the theme of Syracuse’s execution: everybody was in the right spot. Autry’s team needed to be, considering SU’s defense posted one of its most porous efforts of the campaign. Whether it was Betsey from downtown, or Kyle and Freeman underneath, when the Seminoles collapsed too hard on a drive, the Orange continuously found the open man.

The coaching staff drew up a few open shots as well. Autry came up with a zone-beater play for FSU’s 1-3-1 set that it uses for inbounds plays. It’s a set former head coach Leonard Hamilton used to run and now Loucks implements it, too, citing it as the “best inbounds defense in the country.”

Well, Autry drew up an inbounds play with George standing on the baseline as the passer, where the Orange’s forwards crashed the block, drawing the middle of Florida State’s defense with them, and sending Betsey out to the corner for a catch and shoot opportunity.

Loucks said the one thing you can’t do with a shooter like Betsey is let him pull the trigger without forcing him to dribble. But Autry’s play worked and freed Betsey up for an easy 3.

Plays like that, where Syracuse picked apart Florida State’s 2-3 zone, came early and often.

Kyle additionally caused a ton of confusion within the Seminoles’ zone. When the Orange broke FSU’s containment, Loucks said, they threw off its defensive rotations by sending Kyle to the basket on a cut, where he was ripe for lobs from George and the backcourt all evening,

Zone beaters on the inside and zone beaters on the outside — you have to ask yourself if anyone will dare hit Syracuse with a 2-3 again this season.

“It’s going to be tough for some of our smaller guys to do their job if you don’t contain the ball and how fast it comes,” Loucks said of defending SU’s offense.

Published on January 14, 2026 at 2:59 am
Contact Cooper: ccandrew@syr.edu | @cooper_andrews