Syracuse goes global to find impact player

DETROIT — By Jim Boeheim’s estimation, Marek Dolezaj is adjusting to his first year in a new country just fine.

“He seems to be doing pretty good,” the Syracuse coach said Saturday. “He’s doing well in school. He’s got a blonde cheerleader for a girlfriend. He’s starting on a team in the [last 32 left] in the country. I guess he’s doing OK. She drives him all over, too. It almost should be illegal. Probably is.”

The Slovakian has also helped spark the 11th-seeded Orange to a date against No. 3 Michigan State on Sunday in the second round of the NCAA Tournament’s Midwest Region.

Dolezaj led all scorers with 17 points in Friday’s win over TCU on 8-of-13 shooting from the field, making plays his teammates said they haven’t seen him make all year. The 6-foot-9 freshman was just three points shy of his career-high, which he recorded last week against Wake Forest in the ACC Tournament.

Before postseason play, Dolezaj had scored more than eight points just six times in 31 games. He was averaging 5.3 points per game coming into Friday, surpassing that mark in less than five minutes.

“I try to do it every game,” Dolezaj said Saturday. “I feel more confident and I think I’m playing better offensively [than] the rest of the season.”

Dolezaj is getting a crash course on the NCAA Tournament. He had watched some Final Fours before he came to the United States, but was by no means an avid follower.

“Like 0.1 percent,” Dolezaj said. “I was not really interested in it.”

It has his full attention now. Dolezaj took over a starting role at the end of January and has logged 34.9 minutes per game since — all for a kid who was a late and somewhat unknown find by Boeheim and his staff.

“I’ve only taken one player in my career off tape before Marek and he was the worst player I’ve ever had,” Boeheim said. “Normally we wouldn’t even think about taking somebody off of tape. But we were in the summer [of 2017], we had lost a player late or knew we were going to lose a player pretty late.”

Dolezaj had been playing for Karlovka in the Slovakian Extraliga League and starred on his national team in the 2016 FIBA Under-18 European Championship. One of his coaches had sent his film in an email to Syracuse assistant coach Adrian Autry and the recruiting process began.

“He’s one of the only European players that can’t shoot that I’ve seen in the last few years,” Boeheim joked. “But he’s more athletic than a lot of European guys. … He’s a really smart player. If he weighed 200 pounds, 210, he’d probably be one of the better players in the country. He weighs 175 [he’s listed at 180] and he’s a good player, but he gets muscled.”

Dolezaj’s English is getting better by the day, too. He had learned it back home, using it about five hours per week, but never thought he would need it. Then came Syracuse. “I knew it was a really good basketball team with a long history and Coach Boeheim was a legend,” said Dolezaj, whose family and friends have been trying to watch his games six hours ahead in Slovakia. “I think the language was the biggest barrier for me. When I came here I didn’t talk with my teammates and now we’re a big group of friends.”

One that’s one win away from the Sweet 16.