The injury to Arinze Onuaku = Huge Deal
Despite two late season losses Syracuse is still a very good team, and they earned their number one seed by winning the country's best conference by two games.
But without Onuaku national championship hopes are out the window. In the wisdom of Jim Boeheim, he never plays more than 7 guys in a season so in case of an injury the whole season goes down the tubes.
While other coaches use players like Kyle Kuric and Vee Sanford, Boeheim buries his reserves so deep on the bench they often transfer.
Boeheim says Onuaku has only a mild strain but he's not a doctor so Onuaku is going for an MRI just to get a second opinion.
If he's hurt and can't play SU is fucked and will probably be dropped to a 2 seed and knocked out early.
If Onuaku is healthy this team still has a chance to win the national title and should be favored to come out of its region to the Final Four.
If that's the case then maybe something important will come out of this loss.
A little overconfidence may have set in among the players and the fans.
My life as a sports fan is cursed and as soon as I even think good thoughts about one of my teams the rug gets pulled out from under me.
I guess it should come as no surprise that SU lost two straight when Billy began researching steakhouses in Indianapolis and I began bragging that it would be an upset if SU didn't make the Final Four.
Properly chastened I will have my game face (and lucky drawers, which I had forsaken recently) on and hopefully so will the players when the real games begin next Friday in Buffalo.
I've been effectively knocked back into my normal cautious optimism place as well.
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