It is New York, after all, but I'm still shocked at how well Pataki is doing.
Another way to look at it is that he has support of a smaller segment of Republicans than Sanders does with Democrats despite being a former Governor.
This is the one state where his name recognition is pretty high. He had also been reelected with 60+%.
Pataki never achieved 60% of the vote. His large margins in 98 and 02 were due to strong performances by independent Tom Golisano, not Pataki getting 60%. Here are the results from his elections:
1994: Pataki 49-45
1998: Pataki 54-33-8
2002: Pataki 49-34-14