After an early-season confidence boost, push is coming to shove for the St. John’s Red Storm. Will this team make the Big Dance?
The cliche goes: you are not as good as they say you are, and you are not as bad as they say you are. The saying applies to St. John’s after being blown out at Madison Square Garden Saturday afternoon by defending national champion Connecticut.
The scoreboard (77-64) and box score told the story. Connecticut coach Dan Hurley had his team ready to go, and the Huskies played better than they did in their 69-65 win against the Red Storm on December 23.
St. John’s made Saturday interesting by taking a 37-36 lead at halftime. That was as good as it was going to get, though. UConn completed the second half by outscoring its opponent 41-27. Even when the Red Storm was leading, you never got the impression they would win this game, not with how UConn was shooting. Whenever the Huskies needed a big shot, they got it.
What makes the Huskies great is that they get very good guard play. Cam Spencer’s 23 points, Stephon Castle’s 21 points, and Tristen Newton’s 18 points turned out to be the difference in the game.
It sure seemed like Hurley wanted this one after St. John’s head coach Rick Pitino decided to play gamesmanship last month by saying UConn would play St. John’s next year at Carnesecca Arena, something that isn’t likely to happen.
Joel Soriano struggled for St. John’s, largely because he was double-teamed frequently. St. John’s needed their guards to be difference makers, to provide a counterpunch to UConn’s guard play, but that didn’t happen. RJ Luis Jr. again showed that he’s not a guard the Johnnies can rely on, scoring a pedestrian 11 points. Jordan Dingle shot 4-of-11, collecting a dismal nine points. Daniss Jenkins scored six points in the second half after a 13-point first-half performance. And when Spencer got hot, scoring 17 points in the second half, the game was over.
There’s a reason the Huskies are the #1 team in the nation, and they could again be cutting down the nets at State Farm Stadium, where the Final Four will take place this year. They have depth, whether it’s interior scoring or shooting, and Hurley has a polished team that knows what it’s doing.
As good as the Red Storm are, they go through scoring droughts, and it happened again against UConn. SJU has a turnover tendency, too. Those and other reasons explain why the team is heading in the wrong direction, losing five of its last six games. The issue now is notching enough wins against good teams to make the NCAA tournament.
They’ll get that chance when they face Marquette, Providence, Seton Hall, and Creighton. But at this point, I’m not sure how optimistic fans should be. Maybe that’s why St. John’s head coach Rick Pitino spent a lot of time in his post-game press conference talking about NIL and the state of college basketball, roiling the NCAA’s enforcement division throughout his talk.
Saturday’s game provided a sobering reality for Pitino. He did what he could in cobbling a roster to compete this season, but flaws are showing at the wrong time.
A respite in the schedule is coming Tuesday night when 3-19 DePaul rolls into town. 17-5/9th-ranked Marquette looms next in a game the Johnnies need to win (Saturday in Milwaukee, 6 pm Eastern, on FS1).
