It must have been Syracuse’s year, for how else do you go about explaining the Orange’s magical run to the final four, its redemption tour as the savior for SU athletics through a pristine Memorial Day weekend in Foxborough, Mass.? Had the lacrosse Gods hopped on the vengeance bandwagon?

It was talent and chemistry, sure – and a certain Tewaaraton Trophy winner, Mike Leveille – that carried the Orange to its 10th national title, re-branding Syracuse’s name at the top of the echelon of collegiate lacrosse. Not even Bill Belichick – among the 48,970 in attendance in the New England Patriots’ home stadium – could deny that SU was the best team on the field that day.

But there was an externality revving the engines during SU’s postseason run.

A chip on the shoulder, embedded after a 5-8 season: the pressure point for collective embarrassment. The players made it their emblem for a team on a mission.

‘There were a lot of people doubting us as a team coming into the season,’ Dan Hardy said after the 13-10 win over Johns Hopkins in the 2008 national championship game.

In a championship’s wake, there are always questions about defending and repeating, about the challenges of playing through a season with a bull’s-eye on the back. At Syracuse, it’s a tattoo forged after years of final four appearances. Is a bull’s-eye really the hypothetical challenge for a team well accustomed to being at the pantheon of its sport?

Or is the challenge simply defying denouement? The mystique of 2008 has officially worn off. Left to itself, without a rallying card, SU will now need to figure out ways to get inspired other than doubters and detractors.

‘If you look back to a year ago, we went 5-8 and missed the playoffs, and we used that as motivation to come back last year and that worked for us,’ Matt Abbott said. ‘We have to look at the work we put in last year and know that we have to work even harder this year to get the same results.’

Six months ago, all eyes in Syracuse were on Syracuse, of course, because the men’s lacrosse team was the white knight of a university athletic program in the throes of its worst drought. There had been little else to cheer about. SU men’s hoops was an NIT regular and football had won seven games in three years.

It didn’t help that the lacrosse team had been knocked out of the playoffs early in 2006 and then left out in 2007, for the first time since 1982. Three players had been arrested for off-field incidents. Pat Perritt, a preseason player of the year candidate, quit the team in April.

It created a whirlwind of questions coming into last February, and close introspection headed by the team’s senior leaders. They refitted from inside out, putting the focus back on work ethic and community image. Instead of hiding from the onus of 2007, the team went into 2008 embracing the monkey on its back.

In July the team began a grueling training regiment led by strength and conditioning coordinator Hal Luther complete with gassers, milers, lifts and squats. By December, when the weekly training was over, the players had completed the first of many shakeups – one that would prove instrumental down the stretch.

It was an emotional tune-up more than a physical one. It sharpened their vision.

This January, at SU’s annual media day, the questions were about a different sort of falling back. Had the team relaxed after a summer it had been crowned king?

‘I think there’s guys who remember what it felt like a couple seasons ago,’ SU head coach John Desko said. ‘They understand what happens when you don’t take care of things on the team, don’t take care of things with yourself whether it be conditioning or things you do in the classroom or off the field. That message came through loud and clear.’

Always stoic, always laid-back, Desko couldn’t have been calmer in the post-championship press conference in Foxborough last May, despite how emotional such a turnaround season must have been for him. After all, if one person should’ve been conscious of the pixie dust trailing his team all year, it’s the head coach. If one man had any inclination that was a rare mix, it’s the person whose jumpsuit was drenched by Gatorade on the sidelines.

Perhaps he was just riding the wave, too, unwilling to let the carpet ride reach its conclusion. Reality may have hit him like the ice bath itself: a championship won, but can we keep the karma?

‘Last season was great and we accomplished our goal, but it’s a whole new team this year and we have a lot to prove,’ Abbott said. ‘We have to take it one day at a time and try and get better every day and hope for similar results as last year.’

Not every team needs bulletin board material. Not every season needs to be driven by ire or spite.

In 2007, Duke played the vengeance card in its race to the championship game. Last year, Syracuse won it on a storyline of redemption.

The storyline heading into 2009: can they win without the focal point? Can Syracuse get No. 11 without the doubters and detractors that lit the fire to spark the magical run to No. 10?

Zach Schonbrun is the sports columnist for The Daily Orange, where his columns appear every Wednesday. He can be reached at zsschonb@syr.edu.

Published on February 11, 2009 at 12:00 pm