What Adrian Autry said after Syracuse's 95-64 blowout loss to Iowa State

After taking Houston to overtime and falling by four points, running out of fire power in the second half against Kansas losing by 11, Syracuse regressed in the second half against Iowa State Wednesday afternoon, giving up 60 points to the Cyclones in 20 minutes time.

After an essentially even first half with ISU up 35-34, the Cyclones second half showing was as much about their excellent team energy, the stout defensive effort against misfiring SU shooters, as it was about the Orange's total lack of the same. Simply no excuse for Syracuse's lack of notice (less than 12 hours to prepare for a Top 15 team, the same held true for Iowa State.

A day after head coach Adrian Autry preached about the team's need for "Level 5" energy from all 13 roster players when playing in the game or not, the second half performance would have registered a negative number "Level" if anyone was keeping score.

An ugly final 20 minutes of Orange basketball in Las Vegas

There is no way to sugar coat turning a one-point deficit versus Iowa State into a 31 point defeat, even coming on the heels of the Houston and Kansas games.

This is what Syracuse signed up for (expected back next year as well) when the Players Era folks came inviting with a $1M NIL guarantee. Play three games in three days, against either ranked or nearly ranked teams.

"We just didn't fight (in the second half). I thought we let some missed opportunities offensively impact our fight on the other end (defense), and we can't do that," Autry said postgame.

"We fought for two games and a 20 minute half today, but make no mistake about it, we will learn a lot from this," he added. "We will continue to push and that's what I am looking forward to."

Missed opportunities to win Quad 1 games and bolster the team's NCAA Tournament resume

In Autry's first season of 2023-24, SU fell to Tennessee and Gonzaga in November in Maui (only beating Chaminade), and defeated LSU in the ACC-SEC Challenge series.

Last year, the 'Cuse fell to Texas and Texas Tech in November in Brooklyn, and then lost the 'Challenge' game at Tennessee. We now know the three negative results of this year's major OOC tests in Vegas, with defeats to Big 12 members Houston, Kansas, and Iowa State.

With the NCAA Tournament looking fuzzier heading into December at 4-3 with the Tennessee game looming big in the Dome next Tuesday night, the coaching staff has work to do in recalibrating the players.

There is a quick opportunity to show us the improvement that Autry keeps stressing, against a Vols team that just beat Houston Tuesday, but it is going to take the kind of team effort that SU had when losing to that same Houston team on Monday in OT.

"When we fight, when we have that level of fight and we're connected, we can play with anybody in the country," Autry insisted. "I think we showed (in Vegas) that at times If we stay connected, if we play our brand of basketball with that group of men in (the locker room), we have a chance to beat anybody."

Orange Nation may disagree, however, with Autry's rosy outlook, coming in a week in which it is still smarting from a 70-7 football final at Notre Dame, and going from a close, but no cigar, upset of third-ranked Houston, to hanging around for awhile against Kansas, to being blown out by the Cyclones.

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