SYRACUSE, N. DeMarcus Ware Orange Jersey .Y. -- Jim Boeheim won his first game in the Atlantic Coast Conference. He likely wont rest easy any time soon, though. C.J. Fair scored 15 points, including the go-ahead basket with 4:16 to go, and No. 2 Syracuse rallied late to beat Miami 49-44 on Saturday in the Oranges ACC debut. Syracuse trailed 35-29 nearing the midpoint of the second half of a slow-paced game that featured just three fast-break points -- a 3-pointer by Syracuses Trevor Cooney in the first 5 minutes of play. But with the sharpshooting Cooney suffering through his worst shooting performance of the season, the Orange found a way to prevail in the end by going inside against Miamis matchup zone. "When you get into league play, youre going to have games like this," Boeheim said. "Its not easy. Were going to see this a lot." Syracuse (14-0, 1-0) entered the game as one of seven unbeaten teams remaining in Division I and struggled against Miami (8-6, 0-2), the reigning conference champion. The Hurricanes are the only team in the conference with no returning starters, and they lost their ACC opener 61-60 in overtime to Virginia Tech in early December. On this day, they gave the Orange a game right until the end. A long jumper from the right corner by Rion Brown gave Miami a 35-29 lead with 12:22 remaining and the Hurricanes were executing coach Jim Larranagas game plan nicely, taking time off the clock and preventing the Orange from scoring inside. "They had a real solid matchup zone and we couldnt really get anything going," Fair said. "They got good shots working the shot clock down and made us work on defence. Its tough playing defence that long." Still, Syracuse managed to slowly chip away at the lead. Fairs 3 from the right corner at 11:08 was the Oranges first basket of the second half and narrowed the deficit to 35-32. After two free throws by Davon Reed gave Miami a 40-35 lead, Rakeem Christmas scored twice inside -- on a putback and lefty hook in the lane -- to start a decisive 10-4 Orange run. "When we got down, we just wanted to go back out there and be stronger, make big plays," Christmas said. "It got our team going and we turned up our defence from there. We just came together as a team." Jerami Grant hit a jumper from the free throw line, Fair converted a spinning layup in the lane and Tyler Ennis hit a driving layup to give Syracuse a 43-40 lead with 3:19 left. Syracuse overcame a 25-7 deficit and beat then-No. 8 Villanova by 16 points a week ago, but the Orange struggled to find any rhythm against Miami. With 7:54 left, Cooney was 2 of 11 from the field, all from 3-point range. He entered the game shooting 50 per cent from long range (43 of 86), tops in the ACC. "I got open 3s, they just didnt fall," said Cooney, who finished 2 of 12. "Its tough. You just have to hang strong. It was great to see us hang in there." Miami pulled within 43-42 on a reverse layup by James Kelly with 2:15 left, but Ennis scored again inside, and Cooney and Ennis both hit two free throws in the final minute as the Orange prevailed. "We got a little spread out in the zone," Brown said. "We were so worried about the shooters they got in the lane a couple of times and got some easy layups. We deviated from the game plan just a couple of plays and it showed." Miami, which trailed by four points at halftime, started the second half with a 14-4 run as the Orange missed their first nine shots. Garrius Adams, who led Miami with nine points, and freshman Manu Lecomte hit 3-pointers and Brown hit a jumper from deep in the right corner to key the surge. "The tempo was what we wanted. We needed to keep them on defence," Larranaga said. "Time of possession was very important, almost like a football game. Defensively, we wanted to keep them on the perimeter, and thats the one disappointing part for us. Overall, we had a good defensive game plan and executed it pretty well, but at the end they got some interior baskets and that really hurt us." Cooney finished with 11 points and Ennis had 10 points, seven assists and two turnovers for Syracuse. Forward Dajuan Coleman, who sat out Tuesdays game against Eastern Michigan nursing a sore left knee, dressed and participated in pregame warmups but did not play. Kelly and Lecomte both finished with eight points for Miami, which finished 7 of 19 from 3-point range. The Hurricanes didnt look like the team that went 0 for 15 from 3-point range in opening the season with an overtime loss to St. Francis Brooklyn, a program that hasnt finished over .500 since 2003-04. Facing the vaunted Syracuse zone, the Hurricanes were up for the task, hitting 5 of 11 3-point attempts in the first half. Adams and Lecomte hit from long range on successive possessions late in the period and Miami trailed just 25-21 at halftime. Montee Ball Blue Jersey . Police leaflets seen by an Associated Press reporter at a central Sochi hotel on Tuesday contain warnings about three potential suicide bombers. A police letter said that one of them, Ruzanna Ibragimova, a 22-year-old widow of an Islamic militant, was at large in Sochi. Brandon McManus White Jersey . They just probably couldnt have imagined how much. Blake Griffin had 26 points, 11 rebounds and six assists Sunday night as Los Angeles stormed out to a 31-point lead in the first quarter with its All-Star point guard back on the court and pummeled the Philadelphia 76ers 123-78.QUEBEC -- World Boxing Council light heavyweight champ Adonis (Superman) Stevenson and contender Tony (The Bomber) Bellew nearly got an early start on their weekend bout as the two battlers scuffled Friday at the weigh-in. Stevenson took exception to Bellew calling him "a pimp." On Thursday, the six-foot-three British boxer had called the five-foot-10 Stevenson "a dwarf." The tension came to a head after the weigh-in -- both clocked in at 175 pounds -- when they did the traditional face-to-face. Bellew apparently gave Stevenson a tap on the head as some of his fans chanted "pimp, pimp, pimp." It was an apparent reference to the 18 months the Haitian-born slugger from Montreal once spent in a Quebec jail on charges of managing prostitutes, assault and uttering threats. The two boxers scuffled and had to be pulled apart. "He put his head on my head, he shoved his head in my nose, so I smashed my head right back in his nose and I told him what I think of him," Bellew said afterward. "Thats all that happened." Stevenson had another version of events. He said Bellew acted out of fear and disarray. "The guy is desperate," Stevenson said. "When I got to the face-to-face, he gave me a hit and I wanted to give him one back. I wanted to rip his head off but my team held me back. I know hes scared, he tries to hide his fear. I saw fear in his eyes." Bellew (20-1-1, 12 knockouts) is competing in his first professional bout outside the United Kingdom. He is a former Commonwealth champion who lost a previous world title attempt by majority decision to WBO champ Nathan Cleverly in Liverpool in 2011. He has won five fights in a row since then. He doesnt mince his words when it comes to his opponnent, the only Canadian with a world title from one of the major sanctioning bodies and one of the rising stars of boxing with his devastating punching power. Julius Thomas Orange Jersey. "I think hes a little scrote," Bellew said. "Hes a maggot. I dont like what hes about....The minute I called him a pimp, he exploded. "If you call me a Scouser, Im a Scouser, Im from Liverpool. Thats what a Scouser is. If I call him a pimp, hes a pimp. Thats what hes done. Theres no ifs or buts. Thats what hes done. Thats a fact. Thats not me saying hes this, hes not a nice guy. Thats speculation. I called him what he is. Thats what he was." Stevenson (22-1, 19 knockouts) won the WBC belt and The Ring magazine title as linear champion with a thundering left hook only 76 seconds into his bout with American Chad Dawson in June. The southpaw followed that on Sept. 28 by pounding former IBF champ Tavoris Cloud so badly that the challenger quit after seven rounds. Bellew was in the Bell Centre audience for that one. Bellew became mandatory challenger with a 12-round decision over Isaac Chilemba in May. While Stevenson may call himself Superman, Bellew doesnt see him as a Man of Steel. "I have a better boxing brain than him," he said. "This guys got 20 guys around him telling him hes great, hes Superman. He aint Superman. Hes a human being with two arms and two legs. Add to that hes a midget compared to me. He cant beat me." The bout will be held Saturday at the Colisee Pepsi. The co-feature will be another light heavyweight title clash between hard-hitting Russian Sergey Kovalev (22-0-1), the World Boxing Organization champion, and Ismayl Sillakh (21-1) of Ukraine. The bouts are to be aired on the U.S. specialty channel HBO. cheap jerseys ' ' '
