Brunswick, Ga. - Reggie Burke was the leading scorer for the College of Coastal Georgia men's basketball team going into the team's game against Coker College Tuesday night at Howard Coffin Gym.

At the end of the game against the Cobras, the sophomore guard was the top scorer for the Mariners on the night, but he was also the star of the game, too. Burke hit a running left-handed shot just before the final horn to lift the Mariners to a thrilling, come-from-behind 67-65 victory.

The win was the first of the season for the Mariners (1-5, 0-2 Southern States Athletic Conference) after five straight losses to begin the season.

"It gets the monkey off our back," said veteran Coastal Georgia coach Gerald Cox, "and it helps that it was against a very good team."

Coker is an NCAA Division II program. The Cobras were coming off a loss in their season opener on Saturday. The Mariners, in just their second year of play at the four-year level, had never beaten an NCAA program until Tuesday night. No one played a bigger role in the victory than Burke, who was mobbed by his teammates when they stormed the floor to celebrate the huge win as time expired.

"We never gave up. We played hard," said Burke who scored a game-high 27 points for the Mariners. "We had nothing to lose. We had already lost five games in a row."

The Mariners actually scored the game's final nine points to come from behind for the win as they trailed 65-58 with 3:11 remaining. Burke had seven of the nine points to bring the Mariners from behind.

"Good players make plays, and that's what he did," Cox said when asked about Burke's late-game heroics.

The Mariners started their late surge with a basket by Dustin Henry, a sophomore transfer from Coker. After that, it was all Burke. He hit a bucket to get the Mariners within 65-62, and then with nine seconds to play, it was a 3-pointer by Burke from the right wing that tied the score at 65-65. Burke hit the three-ball coming out of a timeout during which the Mariners actually discussed their plan to run a play named "Frankie" which Cox ran back into the early 1990s to get the ball to Frankie King who would go on to play at Western Carolina after spending two years in junior college with the Mariners and later would also play for the NBA's Los Angeles Lakers.

Instead of the play being for King, it was actually designed to get the ball to Kentorey Johnson for a possible 3-point shot to tie the score. When that didn't happen, Burke, who had the ball in his hands, spotted up for a 3-point shot that swished through the net with 4.1 seconds left, tying the score.

"The play got broken up," Burke explained. "I felt good and shot it. When it left my hand, I knew it had to go in. It felt so good, but I was still praying it would go."

It did, and so did his next shot, which was the game-winner at the buzzer. The Mariners got another shot at the win in  regulation after Coker attempted a long pass that one of their players couldn't handle just in front of their bench. That meant the Mariners had to go almost the full length of the court, and they used not one, but two timeouts before running their last play.

On the play, they got the ball in the hands of Burke, who shook off his defender with help from a screen at midcourt by Johnson. Burke then quickly drove toward the hole, penetrating the lane as deep as he could and then lofting a soft shot over the defense that found the hole for the victory just before the horn sounded to end the game.

"Coach Martin set up the play," said Burke, referring to Coastal Georgia assistant Bob Martin, who drew the play up on a clipboard during the team's second timeout. "Kentorey set a great pick. I knew they wouldn't foul me. I went left and it worked."

The Mariners trailed 33-28 after a competitive first half and got down by as much as nine early in the second half. They fought back and actually pulled ahead by as much as four points with just over 10 minutes to play in the game.

It looked, though, like they were headed for another loss, just three days removed from their toughest loss of the season Saturday at Belhaven, when they lost leads late in regulation and again in overtime to absorb an 86-85 defeat. The game was the second for the Mariners in the SSAC.

While Burke led the Mariners in scoring and in the clutch, Johnson had a big game as well, finishing with a double-double that included 20 points and 14 rebounds.

Julian Nelson led the Cobras in defeat with 23 points.

The Mariners will take on a second straight NCAA D-II opponent on Sunday when they visit Augusta State. Tip time is set for 4 p.m.