TAMPA, Fla. — In his first action in two and a half weeks, Syracuse quarterback Eric Dungey turned in an up-and-down performance in a 45-24 loss to South Florida on Saturday.

Much of the game featured the freshman Dungey hadn’t been early in the season. He overthrew open receivers, missed a small handful of reads in the Orange’s read-option offense and committed his first two turnovers of the season with an interception and lost fumble in the fourth.

Then there was the precocious quarterback the Orange saw against Rhode Island, Wake Forest and for a quarter against Central Michigan. With SU down 24-3, Dungey led three scoring drives in 10 minutes. He checked down to Jordan Fredericks, who took a screen 30 yards for a touchdown, scrambled inside 7 yards for Syracuse’s second score and collected its last points on a 7-yard pass to Steve Ishmael on a well-timed curl route.

“I thought he calmed down in the second half and started looking like himself,” Tim Lester, SU’s offensive coordinator, said. “That’s going to happen when you have a freshman guy in there. He’s going to have good quarters and bad; we’ve just got to try to keep him leveled out.”

Dungey finished 21-for-34 with 232 yards, two touchdowns and an interception. On the ground, he ran for 31 yards and a touchdown on 17 attempts. But the defining number for him and the Syracuse (3-2, 1-0 Atlantic Coast) offense — despite the second-half comeback attempt — was the three points the Orange scored in the first half to allow South Florida (2-3, 0-1 American Athletic) to methodically pull away in the second.

The slow offensive start wasn’t all on Dungey but he, as the quarterback, was at the center of it.

“I’m sure the game is still fast for him in his second or third game or whatever it is,” Lester said. “He definitely can move us up and down the field.”

Before a vicious late hit knocked Dungey out of the Central Michigan game in Week 3, his inventiveness and improvisational skills were a strength that also showcased his inexperience. That continued on Saturday, when a missed read turned into his touchdown run, according to Lester, but the offensive coordinator added that he’ll be looking for a complete performance moving forward.

Not one that picks up in the second half when the game is slipping out of reach.

“It was good to see the resiliency,” Lester said. “We’ve just got to get it started earlier.”

Published on October 10, 2015 at 9:48 pm

Contact Jesse: jcdoug01@syr.edu | @dougherty_jesse