Syracuse will have a golden opportunity to cause total chaos in the college football world this weekend.
Heading into this Thanksgiving week, fans of Syracuse Orange will have plenty to be thankful for — a strong start to the Fran Brown era, the production from Kyle McCord, the program’s most second-most wins since joining the ACC, the chance to participate in a quality bowl game, etc.
Above all that and more, nothing will be more rewarding that the Orange having a chance to completely cause havoc to the College Football Playoff and getting yet another chance to make a statement of a performance on national television.
This Saturday, Syracuse’s 2024 season will conclude at home versus the No. 8 Miami Hurricanes. That contest kicks off at 3:30 p.m. on ESPN, one of the few games where bids to the conference championship game are on the line and where a lot can change for the two teams involved.
This cannot be mentioned enough: Syracuse has absolutely nothing to lose here, but it certainly has everything to gain. And wow, could a win do plenty for coach Brown and the Orange.
The Syracuse versus Miami game carries legit significance for how the inaugural 12-team College Football Football Playoff could play out. A win for Miami should send the Hurricanes to the ACC Championship game. However, a loss would send the now-No. 12 Clemson Tigers to the conference title game versus the No. 9 SMU Mustangs, who have already clinched their spot no matter what happens this weekend.
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Talk about a situation… Syracuse having the chance to hand Dabo Swinney and Clemson yet another berth to the ACC title game. But if Syracuse doesn’t pull of the miracle, Miami gets to its very last step needed to revive itself and inch closer to the postseason.
Purely within that context, Saturday’s game will have direct implications no matter what happens: how many ACC teams end up squeezing their way in the CFP, who makes the conference championship and which teams’ fanbases will get the short end of the stick this season. Take a step back and it’s easy to see there is still plenty more at stake for both teams.
The Syracuse-Miami matchup comes at an interesting point for both programs.
Starting off with the Orange, the team is in the first steps of a new era in what’s been a pretty up-and-down century, with some promising seasons largely overshadowed by plenty of bad years, inconsistency across the board and an oftentimes sense of anguish. Syracuse fans long for the days of how good the program was in the eighties and nineties.
Well, it’s a very similar story for Syracuse’s opponent this Saturday. A long-time program didn’t really make too much noise in the college football universe until Howard Schnellenberger and later Jimmy Johnson took over in the 1980s. Miami turned into a consistent national championship contender, a cultural icon and a common team everybody despised. Hell, ESPN made not one, but two different 30 for 30 episodes.
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And then, a similar story for the Orange came about with the Hurricanes. The program regressed starting in the mid-2000s, at least compared to decades earlier. There were some years of promise to get back to that apex level (namely 2017, coincidentally the only other time Syracuse played Miami as an ACC opponent; the Hurricanes won 27-19 in Coral Gables), but it just never quite jelled together for a whole year.
Flash forward to this year, and it’s hard to argue it hasn’t been a great year for both teams. Miami is just a few weeks away from making the CFP and hopefully getting back to what is was. Syracuse hopes this year can be the start of something special in its own program history.
Finally and from the side of the Orange, it’s a game where the team will really not have too much at stake. The Orange aren’t making the ACC title game regardless of what happens. Yet, it is a game that can really do a lot for the program: give a signature win to end year one of Brown’s coaching debut, overcome some of Syracuse’s recent shortcomings in showcase games, get to nine regular season wins for just the third time in the 21st century and beat an AP top-10 opponent for the first time since Clemson in 2017.
Although they haven’t played much as ACC foes, it’s a matchup that does go back deep into the history books. Long-time fans might remember the familiar names on both sides of the ball particularly in the 1990s and those absolutely dogfight of matchups. Maybe you still hold a chip on your shoulder from Miami smoking Syracuse in four straight years (1999-2002), back when the Hurricanes were really in the national spotlight. It’s an odd matchup — one team from Upstate New York, the other from the Sunshine State.
Result aside, let’s hope it’s a game that adds another unforgettable chapter in the history books of the matchup for both sides.
Biased Hurricanes and Orange fan here: I’ll be both happy and heartbroken regardless of the final score.