Mikhail Marinovich has been at Syracuse for three years. But to the SU defensive end, the past two might as well not even exist.

He puts them out of his mind. Gone are the memories of Greg Robinson’s last season as head coach in 2008, in which his defense gave up 40-plus points back-to-back against Akron and Penn State. Gone is the first year under Doug Marrone, which showed improvement but still only led to four wins.

‘It’s hard to speak about previous years,’ Marinovich said. ‘Because I’ve blocked them out of my mind. … I think we’ve just changed so much in the culture around here. I don’t even remember what happened, besides we lost, and the feelings we felt. I don’t ever want to feel that again.’

And now Marinovich and the rest of SU have a chance to help everyone keep forgetting about the past. This Saturday at Cincinnati presents a unique opportunity for the Orange.

Win, and SU finds itself the winner of three of the past four games, all three of which have come on the road against quality Big East opponents. Win, and the Orange’s place in the upper tier of the Big East is firmly entrenched. Win, and Syracuse will have its best start since 2001 and a legit chance to finish at the top of the Big East.

That would make people forget.

Lose, though, and the memories will start to crawl back into view. The longer-term goals of a bowl will still be there. But with two quality road wins over West Virginia and South Florida in the past three weeks, this team should expect more than a bowl bid. Marrone established that after the Orange’s last setback, a 45-14 blowout loss at home to Pittsburgh off the high of the win at USF.

‘What’s wrong with that?’ Marrone said when asked if there were some unreasonable expectations following the USF victory. ‘What’s wrong with someone thinking we’re a good football team? What’s wrong with thinking that you’re better than you are? There’s nothing wrong with that, in my opinion. … You want high expectations. I want my players to think that they’re better than they are.’

Lose, and those memories of Pittsburgh will return. Lose, and SU is just another middle-of-the-road Big East team, which is like saying the Orange is the Nicolas Cage of college football. (You have the occasional impressive ‘Leaving Las Vegas,’ and then you go out and do something like ‘The Wicker Man.’)

Lose, and the mind-erasing will have to happen later. Syracuse players know this. And they want to make people forget — now.

‘We know what we can do,’ sophomore wide receiver Alec Lemon said. ‘And that’s what we’re going to go out there and do. Go out and shock the world. Go out and play the way we can play.’

This contest is a chance to make people forget immediately because it would be such a catastrophic turnaround from the recent history of the conference. Cincinnati has been the Big East champion each of the past two years. Syracuse, on the other hand, has been its laughingstock.

How things change. And so quickly. Cincinnati is on the ropes as a conference power. One week, the Bearcats are taking Oklahoma down to the wire. The next, they’re giving up 27 points to Louisville and 38 points to a USF offense that was hapless against the Orange. And SU left tackle Justin Pugh knows what kind of opportunity this game presents for the Orange to turn it around.

‘Getting a win on the road is big,’ Pugh said. ‘But beating some of the powers in the Big East opens people’s eyes. Obviously, as a player, I would hope that people before the season would know the way we competed last year and that we’d be better. But you have to go out there and prove it before anyone is really going to start to give us anything.’

A team with questions coming into Big East play, Syracuse has proven itself with those two quality road victories. And that could continue on Saturday.

Beat Cincinnati, and a lot more people will forget about the past two — and 10 — seasons of Syracuse football.

Brett LoGiurato is an assistant sports editor at The Daily Orange, where his column appears occasionally. He can be reached at bplogiur@syr.edu.

Published on October 27, 2010 at 12:00 pm