Syracuse, N.Y. ? The white banner in front of the scorer’s table at every NCAA Tournament site lists each team in bright red letters.

At the regional semifinals at the Carrier Dome, one name jumps out  way out  Southern Illinois.

Coach Bruce Weber was asked about his team being among the final 16 with a shot at winning the national championship.

“I’m sure it’s a surprise to a lot of people, except us,” he said.

The 11th-seeded Salukis (28-7) play second-seeded Connecticut (26-6) in tonight’s opening game, with top-seeded Maryland (28-4) facing fourth-seeded Kentucky (22-9) in the second game.

The winners meet Sunday and one of them will move on to the Final Four, a place Southern Illinois has never been. The other three have all been there within the last five seasons.

“It’s been a hectic and exciting week with a lot of national attention,” Weber said. “It’s time to settle down, and if we’re not we really could be in for a long night.”

The Salukis, who tied for the regular-season title in the Missouri Valley Conference, beat Texas Tech in the opening round and rallied from a 19-point deficit to beat Georgia to advance to the round of 16 for the first time since the tournament expanded to 64 teams.

“We played as hard as we had all season last weekend,” said Weber, a longtime assistant to Gene Keady at Purdue. “But this isn’t something that just happened.”

The Salukis took Illinois down to the wire and beat Indiana 72-60 in going 1-1 with the Big Ten this season.

Junior guard Kent Williams averages 16 points.

As for Connecticut, it has won 11 straight games and is in the round of 16 for the eighth time under coach Jim Calhoun. The Huskies’ last trip this far was 1999, when they won it all.