Judah Mintz Leads Syracuse Past Virginia Tech
Led by Judah Mintz’s 29 points, the Syracuse Orange took down the Virginia Tech Hokies with a final score of 84-71.
“I was able to get to my spots,” Mintz said. “They tried to press up a lot but respectfully, I don’t think they were as athletic as me to be able to do that to me.”
After the final home game of the season, the Orange now sit at 19-10 and 10-8 in the ACC. Syracuse travels to Louisville to face the Cardinals on Saturday, March 2nd, the second-to-last game of the season before the start of the ACC tournament.
The game started back and forth, with each team focusing on scoring in the paint. Judah was his usual self, getting to the basket at will and drawing fouls, while Maliq Brown added four early points on pick-and-roll layups. Lynn Kidd played a similar role for the Hokies, adding six points of his own on layups.
Bench scoring was also a significant story, as Kyle Cuffe Jr. flashed with five quick points before picking up three fouls. Quadir Copeland added eight first-half points, including an electrifying fast-break dunk.
For Virginia Tech, Mylyjael Poteat added five early points off the bench, including a tough and-one.
On the back of Mintz’s game-leading 16 points, bench scoring from Copeland and Cuffe Jr., and JJ Starling’s all-around play (6 points, 4 rebounds, 3 assists), the Orange mounted a 45-27 lead heading into the break. Sean Pedulla led Virginia Tech with 8 points (2-3 from three, 2-2 from the line).
In the second half, both offenses started strong, with each team scoring double-digit points in the first five minutes of the half. Sean Pedulla scored a quick six points, while Chris Bell and JJ Starling scored five early points each.
The offenses kept going strong, especially the Hokies, who matched their first half-scoring total of 27 points in just ten minutes. With seven minutes left, Coach Autry called a timeout, with the lead down to 69-62.
After the timeout, the energy shifted, with numerous plays bringing the crowd to its feet. A Brown dunk followed by two alley-oop attempts, one unsuccessful by Mintz, and one successful by Copeland, seemed to fire up the team.
Virginia Tech did its best to counter the punches SU threw at them, but struggled to close the gap further.
“We’re an all-sophomore team, they’ve got fifth-year players, seniors,” said Copeland. “But we stayed composed, I feel like we showed a lot of maturity, we kept the lead and we didn’t let it get too close like Notre Dame.”
Just like the rest of the game, the Hokies struggled to guard Judah, with him scoring seven points down the stretch to help raise the lead back to double digits.
“The one thing I respect the hell out of Judah Mintz is that he's a guy and he doesn't run from it,” Coach Autry said. “That's what makes him really special, he's a guy, and I think when you have a guy, that gives you an advantage, especially when it gets late in the game.”
The Hokies gave a valiant effort, but the Orange were able to close out the game with a final score of 84-71.
For the Hokies, Pedulla led the way with 18 points, while Kidd added 16 points and Hunter Catoor added 12 points. Poteat had 11 points off the bench.
Along with Mintz’s 29 points, six assists and three steals, Starling added 13 points, six rebounds and five assists. Copeland and Brown added 12 points each along with four assists and eight rebounds respectively.
“I thought this game today was probably one of the best games we played, both halves today, on both ends of the floor,” Autry said.
The Orange will look to carry the momentum into March, the most important month of the season.
