Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim is upset with the referee's calls during their loss to Michigan.Dick Blume | dblume@syracuse.com

Atlanta --This is that time in the week where you can ask me anything of a sports-related matter. All you need do is send a question to bpoliquin@syracuse.com (and include your name and the identity of your hometown) … and I’ll do my best to answer it.

And if I can’t, I’ll find somebody who can.

Today’s question? It has to do with that uncomfortable back-and-forth during Jim Boeheim’s media briefing immediately following Syracuse University’s 61-56 loss to Michigan on Saturday night down here in the Georgia Dome.

Here goes …

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QUESTION:If a reporter had asked Jim Boeheim, “Why is there air?” (and I’m showing my age by referring to that great Bill Cosby comedy album of the 1960s), it would have been only the second dumbest question to have asked been asked of him on Saturday night.

The dumbest was the question posed by CBSSports.com’s Gregg Doyel: Was Boeheim going to retire?

Come on. Jim Boeheim was only minutes removed from his team’s losing a nail-biter of a game to Michigan in the NCAA Tournament’s Final Four. Maybe ask that question a week from now or a month from now or whenever. But to ask it at that moment seems incredibly, bizarrely . . . well, stupid.

Why not let Jimmy B catch his breath and decompress from the season? I’m sure that whenever he retires, Boeheim -- who actually seemed to handle the situation with Doyel better than I would have thought he might -- will tell us. And at the right time.

With all due respect -- and this is aimed at your profession, in general -- it does seem that certain reporters eagerly follow the Forest Gump philosophy of "Stupid is as stupid does."

Your thoughts?

-- Steve Laws
North Syracuse, N.Y.

ANSWER: To bring everybody up to speed, here is the official transcript of that “banter” between Jim Boeheim, the 68-year-old Syracuse coach, and Gregg Doyel, a representative of CBSSports.com:

Gregg Doyel: “When do you think you’ll decide, announce, whether or not you’re coming back next year?”

Jim Boeheim: “Why would you ask that question? I expect it from you. I know you. Why ask that question? Are you going to ask John Beilein that question?”

G.D.: “We ask 19-year-olds questions, and they handle it better than you are.”

J.B.: “You ask a 19-year-old kid if he’s going to retire? Really?”

G.D.: “If they’re going to be back next year.”

J.B.: “If you’re going to say something smart, at least be smart.”

G.D.: “I said, ‘back next year.’ I didn’t say, ‘retire.’ If you’re going to be smart, at least get it right.”

J.B.: “I am right.”

G.D.: “Are you going to be back next year or not?”

J.B.: “I’m not going to answer that question unless you ask every coach that question. Are you going to ask John if he’s going to retire or not come back next year? I’ve never indicated at any time that I’m not coming back next year. Ever.”

OK, my thoughts? They are these:

If that small and particular window represented the only time that Doyel had to ask his question and/or if Doyel’s deadline was so severe that that he had no choice but to risk the clumsiness that did ensue and/or if Doyel was trying to get Boeheim’s side of a story that was about to break, I’d have to give the guy a pass. Sometimes awkwardness is simply part of the job.

But if none of those scenarios was in play, I’d agree with your position that the whole situation was more than a bit graceless. There is a time and place for everything, and if there was no urgency to this matter, I believe Doyel would have been better advised to wait and to approach Boeheim in private. But who knows what the man was sitting on?

Me? I’d have bet a fair-sized lunch that Boeheim would have answered in the unyielding fashion he did. I don’t know if he’s coming back for a 38th season as the head coach of the Orange or not (and it’ll surprise me not at all if he doesn’t), but I do believe he’d never have chosen Saturday night, in the bowels of the faraway Georgia Dome, to make that declaration.

As such, there was some folly to the entire endeavor.

Now, as for Boeheim’s part in the inelegance, if he’d wanted to exercise a bit of tact, he could have. And he probably should have. But tact is not among his strong points.

Once upon a time, however, it was in his repertoire. Back in 1989, after his Orange had defeated Missouri in the NCAA Tournament in Minneapolis, a reporter asked Jim if a victory over SU’s next foe, Illinois, would prove to the college basketball world that he, Boeheim, could win the proverbial “big one.”

His response? After a pregnant pause, it was this: “Some questions don’t deserve an answer. And that’s one of them.”

A reply such as that -- short, semi-sweet and without much rancor -- on Saturday might have served Boeheim well.

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Here is the weekly “schedule of events” in Bud Poliquin’s corner of syracuse.com:

MONDAY -- By 8 a.m.: The daily column/commentary. By 11:30 a.m.: “How’d I Do?” By 6 p.m.: “Ask Me Anything” by submitting questions (to which I’ll give answers) on any sports-related topic to bpoliquin@syracuse.com. (Please include name and hometown.)

TUESDAY -- By 8 a.m.: The daily column/commentary. By 11:30 a.m.: “Coach’s Corner,” wherein readers can submit questions to any coach at any level in Central New York (and answers will be posted) to bpoliquin@syracuse.com. (Please include name and hometown.) By 6 p.m.: “The Video Store.”

WEDNESDAY -- By 8 a.m.: The daily column/commentary. By 11:30 a.m.: “The List.” By 6 p.m.: “E-Mail Of The Week,” wherein readers can submit legitimate essays/open letters/observations for purposes of posting to bpoliquin@syracuse.com. (Please include name and hometown.)