Brantley Left Mark in Granada Hills Win : Boys’ basketball: Highlander guard had 21 points, 17 assists and made a dazzling move in an upset of Cleveland.

At the time, it was lost in the shuffle, amid the din of victory, the backslapping and glad-handing. Three days later, though, when detailed post-mortems were conducted, all anybody at Granada Hills High could talk about was Jermoine Brantley’s surgical touch.

Sure, nearly everyone knew that Brantley, a 5-foot-10 point guard, had scored a team-high 21 points in Granada Hills’ 88-82 upset of Cleveland on Friday. Yet one play in particular still was being dissected Monday morning.

Cut it out, he said.

“Oh, man, all everybody’s mentioning is the behind-the-back move,” a blushing Brantley said. “I told them I just used my athletic ability. Shoot, I was humble with them. I’m a humble guy.

“They’re all, ‘That was amazing, that was unbelieeeevable. ‘ “

Make no mistake, the use of those superlatives to describe Brantley’s play in the fourth quarter is no overreaction.

With 4 minutes 55 seconds left and Granada Hills holding a 72-69 lead, Brantley was at his quick-handed best--no mean assertion considering that he finished the game with a career-high 17 assists. This time, Brantley completed the job himself, with a move straight from the made-for-instant-replay file.

After Pat McCook missed a three-point shot that would have moved Cleveland into a tie, Brantley found himself with the ball, sprinting across the halfcourt line. Staring him in the eye from the top of the key was Cleveland guard Andre Chevalier. At full speed, the left-handed Brantley bore into the paint, juked to his left and leaped.

Advisory note for the kids at home: You better have more hang time than a Picasso painting to try this one.

“I’d gone left a few times and I figured he might think I’d do it again,” Brantley said of Chevalier, a rather quick character himself.

From there, Brantley brought the ball around his back and laid it over the front of the rim with his right hand, all while airborne. The partisan Granada Hills crowd went nuts, of course. His coach’s reaction?

Much ado about nothing.

“Hey, he does it all the time,” said Granada Hills Coach Bob Johnson, who has seen Brantley’s varsity act three seasons running. “It’s a normal move for him. The only time he gets in trouble with that is when somebody catches him from behind and knocks it away.”

In some sports, they’d call Brantley “a closer.” When the game is on the on the line, Johnson says, Brantley enters Shirley MacLaine territory. Not only is the guy having an out-of-body experience, Brantley just might be out of his mind too.

“I think he gets a little unconscious,” Johnson said. “I really do. I’ve never been able to explain it, something just clicks.

“He gets so intense at certain points in the game, it’s crazy. He’s always focused when we really need it.”

Focus on this: After his sleight-of-hand move, Brantley elevated his game another notch, scoring eight points in the final 3:10.

“After I scored on Andre, it boosted my confidence,” Brantley said. “To take one of the best defensive players in the Valley to the hoop gave me a real lift.”

It was not as uplifting for others, but everyone had to admit that Brantley was the difference.

“He was very impressive,” Cleveland Coach Marc Paez said. “He’s as quick as anybody we’ve seen in a long while.”

Others agreed. When the jumping and shouting ended and the gym had emptied, former Cleveland Coach Bob Braswell--now an assistant at Cal State Long Beach--approached Johnson on the same part of the floor where Brantley tossed in his left-right combination to talk about you-know-who’s college plans.

Huh? The man who coached Cleveland to the City Section 4-A Division final two times in four seasons wants the scoop on the guy who had just sliced Braswell’s former team to ribbons?

“Well,” Johnson said, “I guess he’s going after the players he wants.”

Like Chevalier, maybe Braswell had no choice. Even though Brantley was long gone, he had the coach right where he wanted him: standing under the Granada Hills basket, trying to figure out what Brantley was going to do next.