Anthony, Syracuse survive scrappy Auburn

? Syracuse hung on instead of coming back, and the Orangemen are suddenly the only Big East team still around.

Freshman Carmelo Anthony scored all 18 of his points in the second half, and the third-seeded Orangemen beat 10th-seeded Auburn, 79-78, Friday night in the East Regional semifinals.

There was no need for another comeback this time as the Orangemen (27-5) moved on to the round of eight for the seventh time overall and fourth under coach Jim Boeheim.

“We got off to a great start, and we’re not used to being in that situation,” Boeheim said.

Syracuse will play top-seeded Oklahoma Sunday with the winner advancing to the Final Four. The Sooners (27-6) beat 12th-seeded Butler, 65-54, Friday.

The four teams from the Big East in the field of 65 went 8-0 in the first two rounds, but Syracuse was the only one to win on the second weekend of the tournament. Notre Dame, Pittsburgh and Connecticut all lost in the round of 16, leaving the Orangemen as the league’s only remaining representative.

Syracuse rallied from a 17-point deficit to beat Oklahoma State in the second round, marking the 14th time this season the Orangemen came back to win.

There was no need for that this time, although this victory wasn’t a sure thing until the final ticks as the Tigers (22-12) hit four three-pointers in the final 1:18.

The last of those was by Nathan Watson at what most of the crowd thought was the buzzer. While Boeheim and Auburn coach Cliff Ellis shook hands, the officials checked the replay and put three-tenths of a seconds back on the clock.

Anthony inbounded the ball to Kueth Duany, and the Orangemen officially had the win.

“We did a good job on their shooters until the end, and then they drilled their threes,” Boeheim said. “It’s fortunate they didn’t start out like that or we’d be going home.”

Duany, a 68 percent free-throw shooter, downplayed what he did in the last half-minute.

“Every player wants to be in the position to ice the game,” he said. “I was the next guy they fouled, and I was there to knock them down.”

Marquis Daniels had 27 points for Auburn, but he had only two in the final 7:35.

With a good portion of the sellout crowd of 15,093 at the Pepsi Arena solidly behind the school located just 21¼2 hours away, Syracuse took control early without getting anything from Anthony, at 22.2 points the second-leading freshman scorer in the country, who struggled against the Tigers’ triangle-and-2 defense.

Duany, scoreless in seven minutes in the victory over Oklahoma State, had eight points in the opening 2:25 against Auburn as the Orangemen took a 10-2 lead.

Freshman Gerry McNamara then took over for Syracuse, scoring seven points in less than three minutes as Syracuse went up 19-7.

Pace, one of the big pluses Syracuse had off the bench Sunday, scored six points — almost double his average — as the Orangemen led by as much as 33-16 on the way to a 37-27 halftime lead.

Auburn shot 30 percent (9-for-30) against the 2-3 zone in the first half, and the Tigers hurt themselves with 13 turnovers, only two off their game average.

“In the first half I didn’t score, and we were winning,” Anthony said “I got everybody shots, and everybody knows I don’t have to score for us to be successful.”