The Syracuse Orange football team wasn’t favored to beat the Pittsburgh Panthers on Saturday night, but there was always the hope they could pull the upset and clinch a bowl bid. Unfortunately, that hope didn’t last much past halftime as SU fell to Pitt, 31-14.
Syracuse actually started the game off looking sharper on offense than they had in a month. Garrett Shrader was 6-of-6 on that initial drive, including a 17-yard touchdown pass to Courtney Jackson to take a 7-0 lead. But the Orange struggled to move the ball for the rest of the first half and into the second before a TD drive in the closing minutes of the third.