Fran Brown has done plenty to give Syracuse Football momentum, but there’s still one matchup that keeps hanging around like a bad memory: Boston College.
In two seasons, Brown has already stacked up real accomplishments. He won a bowl game in his first year and matched the program’s highest win total since 1987.
He pulled off a stunner at Clemson, where Syracuse beat the Tigers 31-21 as a 16.5-point underdog and did it after losing Steve Angeli to a torn Achilles in the middle of the game. He also landed Calvin Russell, the five-star wide receiver from Miami and the university’s third-highest-rated recruit.
That’s a strong start by any measure. Brown has shown he can recruit, build a roster and establish a culture that works. Compared with Dino Babers and Scott Shafer, he looks ahead of schedule.
And yet, one of Syracuse’s oldest football frustrations is still unresolved.
The Orange do not have many true football rivalries that still feel alive and heated. Pitt has the edge in the recent series, winning 20 of the past 23 meetings, even if there’s real bad blood there. West Virginia used to be one of the biggest games on the calendar, complete with the Ben Schwartzwalder Trophy, but the teams haven’t met in eight years outside the 2018 Camping World Bowl, and there are no future matchups scheduled right now.
That leaves Boston College as one of the few opponents that still fits the rivalry label. The schools have enough shared history, enough proximity and enough annual meetings to make it matter.
Since both joined the ACC in 2013, they’ve played every year. Syracuse leads the all-time series 33-25, but Boston College has the narrow edge in conference play, 7-6.
Brown, though, is still looking for his first win in the matchup.
The first loss was the kind that stings long after the final whistle. Syracuse came in 6-2 and in the mix for a possible New Year’s Six bowl spot, making the defeat feel even bigger in hindsight. Once the Orange finished the year on a run, it was impossible not to think about how different things might have looked.
The second loss was uglier. Boston College rolled Syracuse in a game started by Joseph Filardi, a lacrosse recruit filling in at quarterback for the Orange.
It closed out a miserable season and sent Syracuse to the bottom of the conference standings. It also gave BC its only win over an FBS opponent that year.
For Brown and his staff, it was an embarrassing result.
No one is going to say beating Boston College defines Syracuse’s season. But if the Orange drop a fourth straight to the Eagles, that would become the longest losing streak in the series.
And for a program that is not built around chasing national titles or even conference championships, the smaller benchmarks matter. Being the best team in the Northeast ought to be the baseline in Syracuse. That’s not a towering standard, which is exactly why missing it against the school’s closest conference rival is so hard to ignore.
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