NEW YORK, N.Y. - Syracuse finishes the regular season 19-13. Only two of those wins came over top 50 RPI opponents, and both came at home. They also lost 2 of 3 to the Wildcats. Combine that with bad losses at Cincinnati and USF, and losses to fellow fence sitters Ohio St and UMass, the latter at home, and you have the resume of a team going to the NIT. Worst of all though is that with their season on the line, they looked like an NIT team today. It's not like they played well and came up short. They played badly and came up way short.

Villanova won the game by shooting lights out in the second half against Syracuse. The Wildcats shot 17-26 (65%) in the second half including 8-10 from three point range. The Orange only shot 29%.

Syracuse did take care of the ball better in the second half with only six turnovers. Both teams finished with 18, which is high, but better than the first half.

Scottie Reynolds led five Wildcats in double figures with 22. Corey Stokes added 18, Dwayne Anderson had 14, Dante Cunningham 13 and Shane Clark put in 11. The only other Wildcat to score was Antonio Pena with 4.

Donte Greene had 17 to lead Syracuse, with Jonny Flynn pitching in 16 and Paul harris scored 13, but only three in the second half.

We're a couple of minutes from West Virginia and Providence.