Remember these? Yeah, those uniforms represent the first and last time Syracuse went with the elegant orange-on-orange-on-orange look.
Wow.
Three years later, those getups still give me vertigo.
August 31, 2007 was arguably the gateway to hell. Darryl Gross continued to tinker with the jerseys in an effort to squeeze every last penny from the Carrier Dome granite, culminating in the most vomit-inducing uniform combination since Syracuse’s colors were pink and green in the late-1800s.
It was also the beginning of the end for the Groobers Error. He would hang on one more season and singlehandedly make Akron a rivalry game, but the opener that evening against Washington was billed as SU’s coming-of-age party. Here was a Pac-10 school, coming to a rocking Dome, on national television, in Year Three under Groob.
Donnie Webb’s in-game blog:
“It’s early in the second half and this thing is over. Washington has seized control behind its running game. It closed the first half with two touchdown drives of 80 yards. It has opened the second half with back-to-back touchdown drives of 70 yards. If you can’t stop the run, you can’t win. That’s where Syracuse is.
Washington 28, Syracuse 6
10:38 left in the third quarter”
Glorrryy dayysss.
The Huskies embarrassed the Orange in its own house, 42-12. We frighteningly learned the “new Syracuse football” was a house of cards, ready to be blown over with the slightest breeze. All hype, no hope.
And a young Jake Locker stepped onto enemy turf and torched the Orange defense with both his arm and his legs (throwing for a TD, running for two more). Locker turned into a potential #1 pick in the NFL Draft. His counterpart, Andrew Robinson, turned into a back-up tight end. Their guy was way better than our guy.
Tonight, SU travels to Seattle for the back end of this home-and-home. Despite the ‘Cuse being a heavy underdog, fear not. No matter how bad the loss, it can’t be as ugly as it was three years ago.
Posted: D.A.
