The Georgetown-Syracuse rivalry turned 30 last week, but there won’t be any pleasantries when the [two meet at Verizon Center](https://www.thehoya.com/sports/hoyas-prepare-orange-big-east-remains-grabs/) Thursday evening.
With most couples celebrating love over Valentine’s Day weekend, Feb. 12 marked three decades of animosity, trash talking and a whole lot of great basketball games.
On that day in 1980, Georgetown went to central New York for the final game at Syracuse’s Manley Field House. After the Hoyas sunk a pair of last second free throws to end the Orange’s 57-game home winning streak, John Thompson Jr. lit a fire that has been blazing ever since.
The imposing coach took the scorer’s table microphone and announced in his booming voice, “Manley Field House is officially closed.”
It was the first season of Big East basketball and the beginning of a battle for supremacy between the Hoyas and Orange. They ended tied for first place with 5-1 records that year, and Georgetown beat Syracuse in the conference tournament.
Since then, one of the two has finished atop the league in 11 years, and they have combined for 11 more tournament titles. Each team has won a National Championship and been runner-up twice in the past 30 years.
Thursday’s game between the No. 10 Hoyas and No. 5 Orange will be the 65th meeting between the two since the Manley game – Syracuse has won four more than the Hoyas in that span – and yet again, both teams are near the top of the Big East and at the center of national attention.
Although they were all born well after Thompson closed Manley Field House, the current Hoyas know what is at stake when they lace it up against the Orange.
Some were introduced to the rivalry in high school, while others realized what it was all about when they came to the Hilltop. Some talk about the legendary players, while others point to the big games played throughout the years.
However they view the rivalry, all of the players agree that when Georgetown and Syracuse meet on a basketball court, they are part of something special.
“I didn’t grow up a Georgetown fan, but the first time I realized it, I was in high school and I came to a game,” says sophomore guard Jason Clark. “The Verizon Center was loud, it was packed, it was crazy. I remember watching all the stuff on T.V. before the game about it too. It was just a really exciting atmosphere to be a part of.”
Junior guard Austin Freeman remembers watching Carmelo Anthony score 30 points and grab 15 rebounds in a 93-84 overtime win for the Orange a month before they cut down the nets as national champions.
“At that point in time I liked Carmelo Anthony, when he was in college,” Freeman says. “Just coming into the Verizon Center and seeing that game meant a lot. You could see it was a big rivalry.”
For junior point guard Chris Wright, there was not one specific moment he can recall as his introduction to the rivalry.
“When I was growing up, I wasn’t really into the Big East, but I always knew the rivalry between Georgetown and Syracuse,” says Wright, a bit of a basketball aficionado. “[I knew] the guys that are from this area that played in the rivalry like Charles Smith, Sherman Douglas and that crew.
“All the way back to Pearl Washington and Patrick Ewing. I know about the rivalry, and I know a lot about the history of the Big East. It’s an honor to be in this rivalry.”
Ewing was Georgetown’s imposing center in the early 1980s, and Washington was Syracuse’s silky smooth guard. The Hoyas’ Smith and the Orange’s Douglas, two District products, battled it out in the late 80s.
In addition to the players, the rivalry has been about the men that have patrolled the sidelines. Thompson was reviled in Orange country ever since his Manley announcement, and Jim Boeheim has been a constant as Syracuse’s coach for the past 34 seasons.
After losing to the Hoyas in the 1984 Big East tournament championship – a game in which Georgetown’s Michael Graham allegedly punched Syracuse’s Andre Dawkins in the face but was only called for a personal foul – Boeheim said, “Today, the best team didn’t win.”
The rivalry has continued under John Thompson III, who listened to his father’s Manley Field House game on his kitchen radio as a 14-year-old.
“When you talk about Big East basketball, you think about Georgetown-Syracuse,” the younger Thompson said in January before the Hoyas lost at Syracuse. “It’s because of not just the players . but the important games, the significant games. The games that meant advancing or not advancing. The games that meant championship or not championship.”
For the players, the atmosphere and energy surrounding a Georgetown-Syracuse tilt are unmatched.
The Orange will be the sixth top-10 opponent that sophomore center Greg Monroe and the Hoyas have faced in the last month, but there is an extra buzz around this game.
“I’ve played in a lot of big games,” says Monroe, who also won a state title in high school, “And Georgetown-Syracuse is definitely one of the best atmospheres I’ve played in.”
onroe didn’t understand the true significance of the rivalry until he got to campus.
“In high school, you watch college basketball, and you see the commercials about it, and ESPN talks about it, but you don’t fully understand something until you are in it,” Monroe says. “Once I got here and we prepared for the game with the buzz around campus and talking to different people, I think that’s when you fully understand how big a rivalry it is.”
According to Wright, it’s a feeling they won’t soon forget.
“It’s something that you really want to take advantage of and want to play in. It’s something that a lot of us are going to cherish when we get older,” Wright says. “You see all the great games on TV, and now you’re part of the rivalry. It’s special. Every time we play Syracuse, I know something exciting is going to happen and it’s going to be a thrill.”
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