SYRACUSE, N.Y. — Judah Mintz scored 29 points and Syracuse again withstood a second-half rally before pulling away from Virginia Tech 84-71 on Tuesday night in the Orange’s season home finale.
Mintz was 10-of-17 shooting and made all eight of his free throws. JJ Starling scored 13 points and Maliq Brown and Quadir Copeland 12 each with Brown adding eight rebounds for Syracuse (19-10, 10-8 ACC).
Sean Pedulla scored 18 points, Lynn Kidd had 16 points on 8-of-9 shooting and eight rebounds, Hunter Cattoor added 12 points and Mylyjael Poteat 11 points for the Hokies (15-13, 7-10), who have dropped six of their past eight games.
This was Syracuse’s third straight win and it came in somewhat familiar fashion. The Orange had big halftime leads — 15 points over North Carolina State and 20 over Notre Dame — before pulling out four- and three-point victories. Starling’s 3-pointer to open the second half put the Orange up 21, but Virginia Tech came back within eight. Then Mintz led off a 7-0 run over the final three minutes with a three-point play while the Hokies missed their next four shots.
Syracuse shot 57%, Virginia Tech 49%, with the Orange outscoring the Hokies 18-9 off 10 turnovers, ending a three-game run of single-digit turnovers for Virginia Tech.
Syracuse took the lead for good midway through the first half and outscored the Hokies 24-8 over the final eight minutes to lead 45-27 at the break with Mintz scoring 16 points.
Virginia Tech is host to Wake Forest on Saturday. Syracuse plays at Louisville on Saturday.
