Pacing toward the opponents bench, Jim Boeheim slowly lifted his arms above his head, spread them out, and wiggled his hands.

His call to the Carrier Dome crowd to crank up the noise to give his team a boost, and the pairing of fans-to-team worked well.

Syracuse (13-4, 4-0 Atlantic Coast) slugged out an 86-83 win over Wake Forest (9-9, 1-4) before a group of 23,367 in the Carrier Dome on Tuesday night. Rakeem Christmas netted 35 points on 13-of-21 shooting and Trevor Cooney connected on five 3s as he added 21 points, and SU started its Chris McCullough-less road 1-0.

Their efforts were enough to hold off WFU’s Konstantinos Mitoglou’s heroic 10-for-13, 26-point shooting night.

From the start, though, Syracuse’s defense wouldn’t seem to be a problem.

Kaleb Joseph threw down a one-handed transition dunk that was a product of a Wake Forest turnover, and four steals in the first five minutes of the game gave way to a 15-5 Syracuse lead.

But WFU’s Mitoglou struck fire, hitting four jumpers without a miss — including a pair of 3s — with a Devin Thomas bucket sandwiched in between to bring the Demon Deacons within a 21-19 deficit and give Jim Boeheim fits near the Orange’s bench.

Trevor Cooney connected on a 3 to put SU back ahead, but the Demon Deacons attacked SU’s interior to keep pace and Codi Miller-McIntyre sank a half-court buzzer-beater for a 37-36 WFU lead.

After an 11-3 run pushed Wake Forest ahead 50-41, the Orange defense clamped down to force a pair of turnovers, leading to an 8-0 spurt to climb back into the game.

But the Demon Deacons answered with a 6-0 burst of their own. Again SU responded, and a back-and-forth sequence set up a 65-61 Wake Forest lead with 3:52 on the clock.

Cooney drained a step-back 3 right in front of the SU bench to tie the score at 65 with 3:07 left and the teams quickly traded baskets for a 67-67 score.

After free throws, SU held a 69-68 lead with a minute left, and Gbinije hit two free throws for a 71-68 lead, but WFU’s Cornelius Hudson drilled a 3 with 14.1 seconds left.

Gbinije’s lefty layup attempt rolled off the rim and Mitchell Wilbekin’s last-second heave from beyond half-court bounced off the left side of the rim as the raucous crowd was given five more minutes of basketball.

The teams traded baskets until a Gbinije 3 pushed SU ahead by four. But the separation was cut to one when Wake Forest fought back in the final minute of overtime.

Although Patterson missed a pair from the stripe, Christmas hit four free throws in the final 13 seconds.

Still, with three seconds left, Hudson flung a three-quarters shot that spun in and out of the rim, and the Carrier Dome fans sent their arms upward just as Boeheim had.

Published on January 13, 2015 at 10:40 pm

Contact Phil: pmdabbra@syr.edu | @PhilDAbb