Charlotte, N.C. -- The Syracuse men’s basketball team earned an ACC Tournament win over Pittsburgh despite the absence of star guard Tyus Battle. It sounds as if the Orange likely will have to do the same thing against No. 5 Duke on Thursday.

Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim said that Battle suffered a bad bruise after falling hard on his back during the final minutes of the Orange’s 67-55 loss to Clemson to end the regular season last Saturday. He left the locker room in visible discomfort.

Although Battle participated in practice with his teammates on Tuesday, his injury worsened overnight and he wasn’t able to play against Pittsburgh on Wednesday. Despite his absence, Syracuse earned a 73-59 win.

“We thought (Tuesday) during the walk-through that Tyus had a reasonable chance to play today,” Boeheim said. “When he came in today, he was worse. He fell on his back. It’s just a bad bruise. We thought he had a chance to go. But he’s probably, realistically, two or three days away from being able to play."

Battle leads Syracuse in scoring at 17.7 points per game. He has carried Syracuse offensively in many of its best performances of the year, including its first win over Duke. When the Orange upset the Blue Devils in overtime earlier this year, Battle had a season-high 32 points. When Syracuse was able to threaten North Carolina, he scored 29.

Now Syracuse will be without its best player as it tries to beat the Blue Devils, who are expected to have all four of their stars available. Only Gonzaga has been able to beat Duke this season when it has has Zion Williamson. R.J. Barrett, Cameron Reddish and Tre Jones all available.

“Obviously we hope he’ll be able to play,” forward Elijah Hughes said of Battle.

Syracuse players said they didn’t know they’d enter the ACC Tournament without their best player until game day.

“Me and him talk a lot, so I had an idea of how he was feeling,” senior point guard Frank Howard said. “But it was just today (I found out). We had a little walk-though and he didn’t look right. We all told him to rest up and ‘we got you.'”

“I found out when we had practice, we had a little walk-through,” Hughes said. “He just wasn’t in our group at practice. I asked him and he told me.”

Battle was not in the Syracuse locker room when it was opened following Boeheim’s press conference. He wore a full warm-up suit during the game. As the team participated in layup lines, he walked among his teammates offering high-fives. Syracuse advanced to the quarterfinals of the ACC Tournament with the win. Battle was replaced in the starting lineup by Buddy Boeheim, who scored a career-high 20 points.

“The culture here is everyone comes in every day and regardless of how many minutes you play, you come in every day like you’re going to play 40,” Howard said. “We’re all prepared. If one man does go down, we’re going to have someone step up.”

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