Doug Marrone learned a valuable lesson about coaching in the Big East Saturday. Seeing two of the conference’s top opponents rumble into the Carrier Dome and embarrass his team in consecutive weeks gave Syracuse’s head coach insight into what it takes to compete at this level.

It’s a lesson he will take with him moving forward, as he continues to rebuild a desolate program essentially from the ground up.

That’s all well and good. But it does not solve the immediate problem: The Orange has looked overmatched in Big East play thus far and enters the midway point of the season at a disappointing 2-4.

This means Syracuse must finish the year 4-2 to remain eligible for a bowl game for the first time since 2004.

As SU enters its lone bye week, Marrone has the daunting challenge of righting the ship before it’s too late.

‘(The last two games) give us a better chance of knowing where need to go as far as recruiting, what we need to do, and then in the future what we need to do to beat these teams,’ Marrone said on the weekly Big East teleconference with head coaches. ‘The problem we have right now is we’re creating too many mistakes, more so now that we’ve gotten into the Big East than we had earlier in the season, and that’s a concern.’

After winning two straight games at the end of the September, Syracuse appears to be regressing. The offense committed seven turnovers in a 34-20 loss against South Florida two weeks ago, and then looked helpless on both sides of the ball in a 34-13 blowout to West Virginia Saturday.

The team will get the bye week off from formal practice, except for basic weight-training, running and conditioning. Marrone said the coaching staff will devote the next few days to ‘quality control’ – an overarching examination of the first six weeks of the season. He put particular emphasis in correcting the excessive turnovers and penalties, and improving SU’s play on both third down and in the red zone.

Meanwhile, the players will take time off to refocus and prepare mentally and physically for the stretch run. Marrone hopes spending time away from the field and the coaching staff will allow injured players to heal and give everybody the opportunity to clear his mind.

The Orange next plays Sept. 24 at home against Akron, a Mid-American Conference foe that upset SU at the Dome last season.

‘It’s not just a cliché when people say it’s the right time for a bye week,’ Marrone said. ‘I believe that we’ll be able to get our players back, and we’ll be ready to finish strong in the second half of the season.’

Marrone praises Devine

Syracuse devised its defensive game plan Saturday around stopping star West Virginia tailback Noel Devine. Nevertheless, Devine picked apart the SU defense, rushing for 91 yards on 22 carries and a touchdown. He also added an 11-yard receiving touchdown on the Mountaineers’ first play from scrimmage.

After seeing Devine firsthand, Marrone had nothing but praise. He cited Devine’s four-yard touchdown run early in the fourth quarter, comparing his speed and agility to that of former Southern California Trojans, and current New Orleans Saints running back, Reggie Bush.

Marrone coached Bush from 2006-08, when he was the offensive coordinator for New Orleans.

‘From a standpoint of starting and stopping, I don’t think I’ve seen anyone ever really, besides maybe Reggie to be able to do that,’ Marrone said. ‘He’s dangerous, he’s very smooth, he’s low to the ground, he has tremendous vision. I think that this type of player is a very dangerous player, from the standpoint that every time he gets the ball in his hands he can take it to the end zone.

‘I was very impressed with him. He’s a very solid player that keeps a lot of defenses up late at night.’

jediamon@syr.edu

Published on October 12, 2009 at 12:00 pm