Orange Host UConn on Senior Day

After playing five of six on the road, Syracuse ends the regular season with two home games, starting Saturday against UConn. Kickoff in the JMA Wireless Dome is set for 12 p.m.

Fans can purchase tickets to Saturday's game as well as the regular-season final against Miami at Cuse.com/tickets. Those coming to the JMA Dome are encouraged to arrive early for a pregame ceremony honoring Syracuse's senior class. In addition, Syracuse will honor former 'Cuse head coach Dick MacPherson during a halftime ceremony as he is inducted into the Syracuse Ring of Honor.

The Orange and Huskies both enter Saturday's game with identical 7-3 records. Syracuse rebounded in a 33-25 victory at California last Saturday, while UConn is coming off a bye week. In their last contest, the Huskies defeated UAB for their third-straight win. Saturday's game will be the third time the Huskies have faced a team in the ACC. UConn lost at Duke, 26-21, in September and to Wake Forest, 23-20, on its home field.

"I think we (are) both 7-3, UConn has played two teams in our conference and only lost by less than one touchdown," head coach Fran Brown said at his weekly press conference previewing Saturday's matchup. "Everybody in our conference always comes down to the fourth quarter. So, I would say they are a team that's just like every other team in our conference, and having the ability to go against UConn, to be able to just go out and compete against another good football team here from the Northeast, is a good deal with a great head coach they have. We gotta focus on UConn, or we'll be in here sad. So, we need to focus on UConn and make sure we come to practice every day and be able to do everything we can do to be able to go out and beat UConn."

Syracuse has a chance to record their eighth regular-season win on Saturday, something that has only been done twice by the Orange since 2000 (2001, 2018). The team has already secured its third-consecutive bowl appearance, marking the first time 'Cuse has been bowl eligible in three-straight years since 1995-99.

One of the reasons for Syracuse's success this season is its senior class. It's a mix of players who have spent their careers donning the Orange and others who transferred to The Hill at some point during their career. Brown is thankful for the group that has made his first year as a head coach special.

"I love them," Brown said. "I'm so thankful for the ones that came here, the ones that were here, John Wildhack for giving me the opportunity of just, you know coming and being able to coach these kids. These dudes are amazing. They've helped carve me into being a better man already, within less than a year. And I'm just very thankful."

Since Brown's opening press conference nearly a year ago, he has spoken often about his desire to honor the program's past and Syracuse will do just that when MacPherson joins the Ring of Honor in the JMA Dome.

"Coach Mac" arrived at Syracuse in 1981 and led the Orange to a 66-46-4 mark in his tenure, including a 3-0-1 record in bowl games. He presided over the second unbeaten season in program history, as the 1987 team posted an unblemished 11-0 regular season and tied Auburn, 16-16, in the Sugar Bowl. He was a consensus pick for national coach of the year that season, earning the honor from 12 different groups, including the American Football Coaches Association, the Football Writers Association of America and the NCAA, among others.

"If they could ever compare me to Dick MacPherson, I mean I'll be thankful for that," Brown said. "I didn't have an opportunity to meet and know him. I just see a lot of his players, get to talk to a lot of his players, and they're all very good men. All of those guys are really good men. So, I just go off of that. I go off of them. I go off the coaching that he's done and the structure that he's putting in their lives. He's done an amazing job. So, if I could do that part alone, be able to develop men that he was able to develop all those men, that would be amazing. He won a lot games here, so that's important to me, to be able to try and go to reach that. I want to go and reach those same goals that he's done, and obviously not reach those goals – I want to be better, and where it was that he was at, but I'm just I'm crawling it right now first, so I just want crawl into the footsteps that he left behind."

The Brown era is off to go a fast start as he is just the third 'Cuse head coach in the modern era (post World War II) to lead the Orange to a bowl game in his first season at the helm of the program, joining Paul Pasqualoni (1991) and Scott Shafer (2013).

Syracuse University Athletics

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