The Syracuse Orange had been unable to stop the Duke Blue Devils in their two previous meetings. Without Jesse Edwards and Buddy Boeheim on Thursday it seemed unlikely that they could slow down a high-powered offense in the ACC Tournament quarter-final. So Jim Boeheim went into his bag of tricks and pulled out a triangle and two defense to confuse the young Duke squad and give his limited squad a chance.
In the previous meetings Mark Williams dominated the paint shooting a combined 17-21 from the field and AJ Griffin dropped 11 3’s on the Orange.