Syracuse Basketball
The Syracuse Orangemen earned a trip to their third national championship game after defeating the Texas Longhorns Saturday in New Orleans 95-84. Freshman sensation Carmelo Anthony had a career 33 points and 14 rebounds for Syracuse in the contest, stealing the show from Texas star and All-American T.J. Ford, who had 12 points and 13 assists.
The Orangemen will play the Kansas Jayhawks in the national championship game Monday night. The Jayhawks defeated the Marquette Golden Eagles in their semi-final match-up 94-61.
Syracuse is 3-0 in semi-final games, but 0-3 in championship games. Their last appearance was in 1996, a loss against the Kentucky Wildcats.
UB lost another MAC conference match, as the women's tennis team fell at Akron 4-3. Buffalo began the day by dropping all three doubles matches 8-2, 8-6, 8-4, giving the deciding point to Akron. Those games came back to haunt them as they split the singles matches.
Freshman Kristen Ortman won 6-4, 3-6, 11-9 in the second match. Michelle Kollarova won 6-4, 6-3 and Wendy Rose won 7-5, 7-6, with a 7-3 tiebreaker to round out the Bulls' victories.
UB hosts MAC opponents Eastern Michigan and Toledo Friday and Saturday respectively, both set to start at 1 p.m.
Both the baseball and softball teams had to postpone their weekend match-ups due to poor weather. Baseball was set to play Northern Illinois, but the icy field prohibited play. The MAC office will determine when and where those games will be remade.
The softball team was forced to cancel its series with Northern Illinois, which was set for Saturday, and postpone its series with Eastern Michigan until Monday. The games against Northern Illinois will not be rescheduled, but the Bulls will play the doubleheader against the EMU Eagles at noon on April 7 at the UB softball stadium.
Photo: Courtesy of Laron Fomby
