Few teams beat their opponents like the Syracuse Orange did on Thursday night, pummeling the Montana Grizzlies, 81-34, in San Jose, Calif.
Syracuse vs. Montana: Orange ‘suffocate Grizzlies’ in March Madness win
The Orange never left any doubt, steamrolling the Grizzlies to advance on Thursday night.
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The No. 4-seeded Orange jumped out early and never looked back, putting to rest any ideas of an upset by Montana. The contributions were many, led by guard Brandon Triche, who scored a game-high 20 points.
Over at our Syracuse blog, Nunes Magician, Jared E. Smith wrote about how the game began in favor of the team from New York:
Kudos to the Orange. Right away, the strategy was to pound the under-sized Grizzlies by using C.J. Fair, who tallied nine of Syracuse's first 18 points, including its first six.
From there, the game plan was, shockingly, to use a half-court offense to force Montana to guard Syracuse's athletes and suffocate them with the 2-3 zone. This allowed everything to open up and it was over less than 10 minutes into the game.
DaJuan Coleman and C.J. Fair also scored in double-digits for Syracuse, pouring in 12 and 13 points respectively. With the victory, Syracuse moves on to play the California Golden Bears, who knocked off the UNLV Runnin' Rebels as a No. 12 seed out of the Pac-12.
The styles are similar between the two squads, with both leaning heavily on their guards.
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