Syracuse is headed back to Madison Square Garden, and the assignment is a heavyweight one.
The Orange will face No. 13 St.
John’s on Sunday in their first game at the Garden since 2021, and the matchup arrives as another early test for Gerry McNamara’s team. Syracuse is coming off a narrow loss to Indiana in Indianapolis on Monday, a game that showed a level of fight and urgency the Orange have not always carried in recent seasons.
Now they get a Red Storm team that has been rolling under Rick Pitino.
St. John’s is 3-0 and comes in with the kind of profile that makes this a real measuring-stick game for Syracuse, which is trying to build the kind of resume that can end a five-year NCAA Tournament drought. The Orange are 2-1, and this is the second straight time they’ll play in an NBA arena.
Syracuse still owns the all-time series, 52-43, but the recent history leans toward the Red Storm. The teams last met on Nov. 22, 2022, when St.
John’s beat Syracuse 76-69 in overtime in the Empire Classic Championship Game at Barclays Center. That was Jim Boeheim’s final season, and it came before Pitino took over in Queens.
In that game, Joe Girard III went 1-for-10 from the field, while Andre Curbelo scored 23 points, Joel Soriano had 19 and David Jones added 18 for St. John’s.
Pitino has quickly changed the look of the program since arriving in 2023. St.
John’s had made the NCAA Tournament only four times from 2001 to 2023, and one of those trips was later vacated. Under Pitino, the Red Storm have reached the tournament as a No. 2 seed and a No. 5 seed in the last two years.
This season, they were picked second in the Big East preseason poll and entered the AP Top 25 at No. 13.
The roster has been built with transfer talent, though one of the biggest names is already out. Former Syracuse forward Donnie Freeman, who came to St. John’s after two injury-marred seasons with the Orange, is done for the year with a torn Achilles suffered in June.
Even with that setback, the Red Storm have plenty of production. Auburn transfer Keyshawn Hall leads the team at 18.7 points per game, Baylor transfer Tounde Yessoufou is scoring 16.7, and Quinn Ellis is averaging 9.0 assists.
Ellis is 23, and St. John’s also has two other players 23 or older who previously played professionally - Babacar Sane in the G League and Zsombor Maronka in Europe.
Kyle Cuffe Jr., who spent two years as a Syracuse role player, also transferred to St. John’s from Mercer and has a limited role there as well.
One notable wrinkle: St. John’s has not faced another Power Five team or any opponent ranked above 196 by KenPom.
For Syracuse, the path is pretty clear. The Orange showed in Indianapolis that they can hang when they bring energy, defend with purpose and shoot the ball well.
They hit 51% from the field and 42% from 3 against Indiana, and that kind of efficiency will be needed again if they want to stay with the Red Storm. Just as important, Syracuse can’t let a St.
John’s run knock it off course.
There are some questions on the perimeter, though. Mark Morano played only eight minutes against Indiana after rolling his ankle, and his status for Sunday is unknown. Temple transfer Aiden Tobiason has not played this season as he works back from a hamstring injury suffered in the exhibition games.
St. John’s may not have the size of a classic bruising front line, but the Red Storm are long enough to make life difficult.
Their top four scorers - Hall, Yessoufou, Ian Jackson and Lefteris Liotopoulos - are all 6-foot-6 or shorter, while Ellis gives them another layer of playmaking in the backcourt. Syracuse guard Ryan Moesch turned heads Monday with 19 points, six assists and two steals, and he and Garwey Dual will be asked to handle St.
John’s guards after both have shown defensive ability early this season.
One number ties the whole thing together: 12. That’s how many of Boeheim’s assistant coaches in his 47 years at Syracuse went on to become head coaches.
Two of them - the first and the most recent to lead a program - will be on opposite sidelines Sunday. Pitino was the first, leaving Boeheim’s staff in 1978 to become head coach at Boston University.
McNamara was the latest, taking over at Siena in 2024 before returning to Syracuse this year after 15 seasons on Boeheim’s staff.
And then there’s Ellis, the player to watch. He was born in Sheffield, England, then moved to Italy at 16 to join Orlandina Capo d’Orlando’s development program in Sicily.
He climbed through the pro ranks with Orlandina, then Aquila Basket Trento, and eventually reached the EuroLeague with Olimpia Milano in 2025. Now at St.
John’s after choosing the Red Storm over Duke, Louisville, Kentucky and others, he has already piled up 27 assists in three games.
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