Syracuse basketball playing in Philly brings back fond memories of Big East days

When the Orange face off against Drexel Saturday in Philadelphia (3:30 p.m. ET / Peacock), it will be the first time since December 2014 that SU has played a game in the City of Brotherly Love.

Oct 25, 2025; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA; General view of the exterior of Xfinity Mobile Arena before a game between the Philadelphia 76ers and the Charlotte Hornets. Mandatory Credit: Bill Streicher-Imagn Images | Bill Streicher-Imagn Images

The next Syracuse opponent Saturday at Xfinity Mobile Arena in the South Philly Sports Complex will not be the Orange's former longtime rival Villanova, which ironically was the last SU foe in another venue Orange Nation is impatiently waiting to return to - Madison Square Garden (last game in 2017).

Instead, SU meets a 1-1 Drexel team that fell to future SU opponent Saint Joseph's 76-65 last Saturday, and plays at Colgate Tuesday night. The event is part of a bid to showcase Philly's Big Five college teams in what is being presented as the "Autumn Invitational" of the "Basketball on Broad" (Street, that is) series, with La Salle and Penn State meeting in the opening game followed by 'Cuse-Drexel.

The Orange last appeared in its former regular Big East pitstop on December 20, 2014 in their second season in the ACC. The game against 'Nova in front of a near sell-out crowd of 18,369, was not a fun one for the thousands of SU fans on hand, watching a four point lead evaporate in the final ten seconds of regulation, followed by an overtime defeat.

The Drexel game part of Syracuse basketball's overall scheduling philosophy

Syracuse coach Adrian Autry made clear before the season that there was a method to the madness of his team's non-ACC schedule. He and his staff concentrated the out-of-conference portion on a mix of games against both ranked and non-ranked teams on neutral courts (Player's Era Festival in Las Vegas), along with enough winnable games at home (see the five games between December 11-22) to balance out the team's status for NCAA consideration.

That included Autry wanting to open up the exhibition season on the road, making a short bus trip to play against a MAC team in a building (KeyBank Center) that will be a host site of first/second round NCAA games come March, and the exposure of playing in Philly at the Sixers home arena, against a team picked 13th (out of 17) in the preseason Coastal Athletic Association coaches poll, also in a venue that will also host first/second round NCAA games.

"With a new group, it's a good mix for us early on," Autry said in October at the ACC Tipoff event, in describing his desire to get four games against lower ranked programs under the team's belt before heading to Vegas to face Houston, Kansas, another quality team, then back to the Dome for Tennessee. "Drexel is a neutral court, too, and I thought that would be a good (environment) for us."

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