Pitino’s Red Storm Needs Big East Results
Photo: Special to the NY Beacon
By Andrew Rosario
When the St. John’s Red Storm took the floor this past Saturday at Madison Square Garden against the Georgetown Hoyas, they were heavily favored by close to 20 points. Obviously, the Hoyas never got that news as they gave the Jonnies everything they could handle before falling short in the 86-79 loss. The win for St. John’s ended their regular season with a 19-12 record, 11-9 in the conference the most conference wins for the school since the 2010-2011 season.
Georgetown on the other hand, season continued to be a total disappointment as they fell 9-22 overall and 2-18 in the conference.
It looked at the start of the game that the point spread was justified as the Red Strom jumped out to a early 12-0 lead. The Hoyas would right themselves going on a 14-4 run taking their first lead of the game at 22-21. By halftime, St. John’s lead was only 4, 39-35.
The Red Storm kept the Hoyas at bay in the second half and after a Chris Ledlum 3-point play with 3:39 left put them up by 10, it basically sealed the game.
Daniss Jenkins led St. St. John’s with 23 points while teammate RJ Luis, Jr scored 14 of his 16 points in the second half. It was the 5th straight win for the Red Storm hoping the momentum will take them deep in the Big East Tournament.
The tournament begins Wednesday night when #8 Butler faces #9 Xavier. #7 plays #10 Georgetown followed by #6 taking on #11 DePaul. Thursday, #1 UConn will play the winnner of Butler/Xavier. #5 St. John’s will battle #5Seton Hall. #2 Creighton will take on either Providence or G’Town while #3 Marquette will take on either Nova or DePaul. The Semi-Finals will take place Friday night and the Finals Saturday night.
When Rick Pitino was hired to take over the program, his goal was to get the school into the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2019. The team started off strong and then hit a stretch when they struggled. After blowing a 19-points second half lead to Seton Hall which dropped the 3-games below in the conference, Pitino took them to task. The team responded as they won their last 5 games.
In order for the St. John’s Red Storm to be part of March Madness they need to take advantage of playing at their second home and start by avenging the loss to Seton Hall.
