Jim Boeheim wasn’t the least bit pleased with Syracuse’s offensive performance in its last two games.

The Orange is undefeated, but following a grind-it-out, 62-56 win over Marshall on Tuesday, the SU head coach picked apart his team’s offense as if he had a team in turmoil.

‘Offensively, we probably had 10 fast-break opportunities that we didn’t convert, that you have to convert those,’ Boeheim said. ‘We just made some bad decisions, bad pass, bad decision, you’ve got to convert those. We just didn’t and it’s disappointing.’

The Orange’s (9-0) inability to finish fast-break opportunities and a cold shooting streak from 3-point range are two of the biggest reasons for Boeheim’s displeasure with his team’s offense this week. But despite shooting 21 percent (6-of-28) from beyond the arc, SU pulled out four- and six-point wins against No. 12 Florida and Marshall. With two of its tougher nonconference opponents out of the way, No. 3 Syracuse now looks to correct its scoring deficiencies to remain undefeated against a weaker George Washington (4-4) team.

SU and the Colonials play Saturday at 7 p.m. in the Carrier Dome.

George Washington fell 81-54 to then-No. 24 California in its only other matchup with a ranked team this season, so there’s hope that the Orange could steady the offense and please Boeheim.

‘The last two games we played two pretty good teams. We have not played well,’ Boeheim said. ‘We have not played well on offense, by any stretch of the imagination, by any interpretation of good offense at all.’

By forcing 19 turnovers, including 12 steals on SU’s part, the Orange had opportunities to blow away Marshall. But as Boeheim alluded to, Syracuse’s moves in the open court erred on the side of reckless.

Upon grasping a loose ball late in the last minute of the first half, SU forward Kris Joseph pushed the ball in transition. He drove to the hoop but then attempted to pass back to a trailing Scoop Jardine.

Marshall guard Damier Pitts was within range of Jardine and knocked the ball away out of bounds. Possession was given to the Orange, but Syracuse failed to score after having a fast-break opportunity.

‘Just make simple plays,’ said forward C.J. Fair, who shot 0-of-4 on Tuesday. ‘Sometimes we go for the home run and come up short. So we just got to make the simple play and find our rhythm and hit shots we normally hit.’

After scoring 90-plus points in three straight games, Syracuse’s offense regressed in the NIT Season Tip-Off in New York City. In back-to-back games, the Orange got off to a slow start and failed to score 70.

Against Stanford in the NIT Season Tip-Off title game, the Orange pushed the ball up court in transition off a missed free throw in the second half. Down 43-41, Jardine threw an alley-oop attempt to James Southerland which would have tied the game.

The toss was mishandled, and the Cardinal took over. Still, SU came away with a win.

‘It’s only a matter of time when we start clicking,’ SU guard Dion Waiters said. ‘So as long as we’re doing everything that we’re supposed to do on defense, our offense is going to come. Because I don’t think we can get any worse than we’re playing offensively now.’

Relying on defense to win early games will serve as a lesson down the road, and Fair said playing a couple of games in which Syracuse isn’t ahead by dozens will prepare the Orange for the tough Big East slate.

The poor execution returned in the second half against the Thundering Herd, too. Leading 39-26 and pushing on a fast break off a rebound, Jardine had Waiters to his right and Joseph coming on his left. The point guard dished to Waiters, who drove into the lane and then tried to fire a hard bounce pass back across the paint. But the pass never got through, and despite having numbers on the break, the ball went the other way as SU center Baye Keita committed a foul.

Marshall and Florida were of a different caliber than most of the teams SU faced early in the season. And though George Washington may be a lesser opponent on Saturday, the Orange’s game after that — a trip to North Carolina State — could again test Syracuse if it’s faulty offensively.

‘You think coming into these two games if you play this way, you could lose one or both,’ Boeheim said. ‘I think we’ve got to feel fortunate that we’ve won both, but we’ve got to also try to get better on the offensive end.’

mcooperj@syr.edu

Published on December 7, 2011 at 12:00 pm

Contact Mark: mcooperj@syr.edu | @mark_cooperjr