In all of the excitement around the football team’s matchup with Notre Dame on Saturday, you’d be forgiven for downplaying the Syracuse Orange men’s basketball team’s own trip to New York City this weekend.
The No. 15 Orange face one-time rival UConn on Thursday in a game that matters in the sense that we want to win, but not necessarily in the same way we once did. Conference realignment drove a wedge in between some rivalries for numerous teams, and SU’s with the Huskies is clearly one of them.
Still, playing at Madison Square Garden has long been a part of playing basketball for Syracuse, and this game (and the subsequent game against Iowa/Oregon) is a continuation of that story and sell.