ST. LOUIS — Syracuse and Dayton had combined to make just two shots through nearly the first four minutes of their matchup on Friday afternoon. Just one layup and a tip-in from Dyshawn Pierre.

It wasn’t until Steve McElvene slammed home a powerful dunk to make it 6-4 that either team could really find a rhythm. The 6-foot-11, 268-pound redshirt freshman is exactly the type of inside presence that has punished Syracuse this season. Whether it was Georgetown’s Bradley Hayes, who scored 21 points against SU, or Pittsburgh’s Ryan Luther, whose 13 points helped propel his team to a win in SU’s last game.

Those sometimes inexperienced or seldom-used big men have found ways to beat the Orange. After that dunk it looked like he might able to find that same success.

“Steve had some opportunities, especially early in the game,” Dayton head coach Archie Miller said. “In Steve’s 19 minutes or so I thought he had a better impact on offense than defense.”

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That dunk turned out to be one of the few highlights for McElvene on an otherwise futile day for him and the Flyers (25-8, 14-4 Atlantic 10) big men. Syracuse (20-13, 9-9 Atlantic Coast) outrebounded Dayton, 48-28, scored six more points in the paint, and used that to propel a 70-51 win at the Scottrade Center.

McElvene’s struggles highlighted the larger issue for UD, as he scored just two points in the second half and pulled down only six rebounds on the afternoon.

“They got the ball inside, but their 6-foot-6 guys were shooting over out 6-foot-10 guys,” SU head coach Jim Boeheim said. “We came in and got the ball off the backboards. We struggled a little bit this year rebounding the basketball … and that was really the difference in the game.”

It was SU’s Tyler Roberson instead that bullied McEelvene on the glass, going for 18 rebounds. The Flyers are a fairly small team, and it’s one prototypical big man threat just wasn’t one.

After the game, it was McElvene that took part of the responsibility for his team’s loss. Even with the large score deficit, it was only a handful of plays that he could have made that would have turned the tide of the game.

“I’m pretty disappointed,” McElvene said, “because, as an individual, if I had grabbed a couple more rebounds, we could have been in the game.

Published on March 18, 2016 at 6:07 pm

Contact Sam: sblum@syr.edu | @SamBlum3