CORAL GABLES, Fla. — Pity that such unsightly performances should occur in this city, dotted with pastel hotels and lined with palm trees.

Yet just miles from South Beach, where condos sprout from the shores and beautiful people mingle in bars along Ocean Drive, the Syracuse men’s basketball team put on a show more appropriate for the Rust Belt than the Sun Belt.

It was like MC Hammer playing Madison Square Garden. A Pauly Shore flick premiering in Cannes. Truly, a putrid main event set against a spectacular backdrop.

Still, the Orangemen managed to win, 54-49, yesterday afternoon with much help from Miami, which failed to score in the final 8:38. Considering the Convocation Center’s ceiling — snaked with pipes and resembling that of a Sam’s Club — the game was, fittingly, a wholesale of missed shots, a layup liquidation.

Carmelo Anthony and Gerry McNamara, the Orangemen’s top scorers, shot a combined 5 of 25 and 2 of 17 from 3-point range. Syracuse shot a season-worst 16.7 percent on 3-pointers.

‘With those guys going 5 of 25, for us to come out of here with a win is a small miracle,’ SU head coach Jim Boeheim deadpanned. ‘It doesn’t matter how many ugly games you had or how many pretty games you had. It only matters how many games you win. We’re gonna play well and not win some games this year.”

The Hurricanes’ leading scorers, Darius Rice and James Jones, combined for 9-of-29 shooting. Miami scored a season-low 19 second-half points and shot 31.7 percent from the field.

After the 8:38 mark of the second half, Miami went 0 of 15 and committed four turnovers. The Orangemen scored just nine points during that span, seven of which came on free throws. To boot, Syracuse’s 54 points were a season low.

‘You can’t go eight minutes without a bucket,’ Miami head coach Perry Clark said. ‘That’s why they won the ball game.’

Certainly, Kueth Duany’s 17 points and Hakim Warrick’s 18, 14 of which came in the second half, helped the Orangemen. But just like slick South Beach club owners passing out promotional flyers, the Hurricanes essentially handed the game away.

Still, it was a win, as Duany clichd afterward while strolling through the arena’s bowels. So go ahead, credit the SU defense for denying the Hurricanes low-post opportunities and keying on Rice late in the game.

But remember: eight scoreless minutes. How else could the Orangemen have pulled this one out while shooting 37.3 percent, their worst performance since they shot 35.8 percent in a season-opening loss to Memphis?

Assuming they could stomach this, the Orangemen’s next two home opponents — Pittsburgh on Saturday, Georgetown on Feb. 3 — must be licking their chops over SU’s worst offensive output of the season.

Another outing like this from the young Orangemen, and the Panthers and Hoyas will surely turn the Carrier Dome into a slaughterhouse.

While recognizing that McNamara’s shooting won’t get much worse than this, Boeheim smartly downplayed Saturday’s win, choosing to sardonically criticize SU centers Jeremy McNeil and Craig Forth, who combined for four points.

‘They’re doubling Carmelo, and (our centers) can’t even get in an open spot, and nobody’s guarding us,’ Boeheim said. ‘It’s pretty hard when you’re in college, and nobody’s guarding you, and you can’t score. That’s a pretty bad statement of what you’re doing out there.”

In 26-plus years, Boeheim’s learned a thing or two about escaping with a road win. So after his press conference, he gathered his players and rushed them to the bus.

One by one, the Orangemen filed out of the Convocation Center, squinting at the picturesque Miami sun, grateful to leave the ugliness behind.

Darryl Slater is an assistant sports editor at The Daily Orange, where his columns appear regularly. E-mail him at dpslater@syr.edu.

Published on January 26, 2003 at 12:00 pm