Fun Facts: Iowa-Syracuse basketball

1. This was written Thursday on Hawkeyesports.com: Thursday's 2K Classic game against No. 10 Texas will be a defining early-season game for the 25th-ranked University of Iowa men's basketball team

.

Iowa lost, 71-57. Hawkeyesports.com may want to soften its stance.

2. Iowa's Aaron White was 14-of-16 from the foul line Thursday, setting career-marks in free throws and free throw attempts.

3. Hawkeye guards Anthony Clemmons, Trey Dickerson, Mike Gesell, Peter Jok and Josh Oglesby all made one basket Thursday. They were a combined 5-of-29 from the field.

4. Iowa has shot 26.1 percent and 29.6 percent in its last two games in Madison Square Garden, a 74-54 NIT championship-game loss to Baylor in 2013, and Thursday night's defeat to Texas. Syracuse shot 26.7 percent Thursday in its 73-59 loss to California.

5. Syracuse forward Rakeem Christmas has 112 career starts. His Twitter user name is @R_Xmas25. As of Friday morning, his most recent tweet was 'My head is killin me.'

6. Jim Boeheim was in his fourth season as Syracuse's head coach when his team lost 88-77 to Iowa in an NCAA East Regional Sweet 16 game. The then-Orangemen (now Orange) went 26-4 that season.

7. Boeheim has had 20-plus wins in 36 of his 38 full seasons as head coach. He has had just two losing records in 35 years of conference play.

8. Today's game will be Syracuse's 169th in the Garden. It is 93-75 there.

9. In the 2014 NCAA tournament, Syracuse was eliminated by Dayton. Iowa was eliminated in

Dayton.

10. This was Boeheim talking publicly about gun control after his 900th career win: