After watching Mike Coburn play point guard alongside Jonathan Mitchell at Mount Vernon (N.Y.) High School, Brandon Triche saw Coburn was good. But half a decade ago, Triche said he couldn’t confirm why.

Now Triche realizes Coburn, Rutgers’ starting point guard, played a certain way. He played with grit and strength typical of New York guards such as Stephon Marbury.

Up until Syracuse’s 84-80 overtime win over Rutgers on Saturday, Triche said he saw less of that Marbury-like Coburn in Coburn’s college years. But Saturday, Coburn stepped up for a struggling Mitchell, the Scarlet Knights’ leading scorer. And it validated to Triche exactly why Coburn seemed so good back then.

‘This is the first year,’ Triche said. ‘I haven’t seen him play much. This is the first game where I’ve seen him play like he did in high school.’

In the first half Saturday, Coburn’s 12 points flashed Triche back to the days of watching Coburn and Mitchell’s Mount Vernon squad on television. He finished with 18 total points as Triche and the Orange keyed on stopping him in the second half.

Coburn’s overall game quickly briefed SU small forward Kris Joseph on his playing style: a player not afraid to talk smack.

Down one at halftime, seconds after Coburn hit a buzzer-beating shot, Joseph and Triche knew a win would come if they stopped the Rutgers point guard. They’d already muzzled his partner, Mitchell, who finished 6-of-17 from the field.

In the second half, the Orange did just that. In 22 second-half and overtime minutes, Coburn was held to six points as his temper flared with Joseph. Combined with the Orange’s team effort in defending Mitchell, SU’s halting of the Mount Vernon duo led SU to the win.

Mitchell entered the game averaging 23.5 points in Rutgers’ last four Big East games, but he finished with 13 points on 1-of-6 3-point shooting. The teammates may have brought flair stemming from familiarity, but Syracuse shut down the duo when it mattered. For Coburn, it was after halftime. And Mitchell was held in check all game.

‘I think we did a better job on him than anybody,’ SU head coach Jim Boeheim said of Mitchell.

SU’s scouting report on Mitchell entering the game was carried out by Joseph, Triche and C.J. Fair in SU’s zone. Triche said Syracuse knew Mitchell would pick in the middle of the Orange’s zone to then ‘pop out’ for open shots.

But he was rarely left open as the goal was to make Mitchell shoot off balance by approaching him from intelligent defensive angles.

‘Proper angles, not giving him a good look,’ Joseph said. ‘Just keeping him frustrated and keeping the high hand out on him.’

Still, Joseph knew Mitchell’s winner’s mentality would surface eventually. Mitchell won multiple New York state championships with Coburn at Mount Vernon. He was also part of a national championship team at Florida his freshman year before he transferred to Rutgers and reunited with Coburn.

During the game, Joseph said Mitchell told him the Scarlet Knights never give up. Then they stormed back to tie the game and take the lead near the end of regulation with two free throws from Coburn.

But it was only a positive blip in a frustrating end to the game for Coburn. The frustration reached a boiling point after SU reclaimed a two-point lead with 12:43 left in regulation when Joseph threw Coburn to the ground.

Joseph said Coburn grabbed and held his jersey all game. Joseph finally gave in, and in response, Coburn popped up from the floor and verbally threatened Joseph inches from his face.

‘They say the second guy always gets caught, but I didn’t this time,’ Joseph said. ‘I just kind of pushed him to the floor because he was grabbing me. He was holding me, and I was trying to get rebounding position. … It was just a basketball play, nothing personal between us.’

Personal or not, Joseph didn’t respond at all to Coburn’s jawing. On the very next play, he let two of his game-high 21 points do the talking. Joseph drove baseline and posterized Rutgers’ forward Robert Lumpkins with a savage tomahawk dunk.

And with that, Joseph made his statement.

Said Joseph: ‘I wanted to make a play where I made a statement with that dunk.’

aolivero@syr.edu

Published on February 18, 2011 at 12:00 pm