St. John’s soccer ties to Seton Hall in disappointing result

St. John’s soccer plays out to a tie against Seton Hall despite dominating the game

On Saturday night at Belson Stadium, the St. John’s soccer team looked to come out of its bye week with a big result over the defending Big East Champions Seton Hall who have not looked anywhere close to last year’s incredible Pirates team.

St. John’s controlled the game from start to finish, there’s no other way to put it.

The game finished in a scoreless draw in double overtime with the shots 16-5 in favor of the Red Storm.

There were so many chances for St. John’s to win this game, but they just couldn’t punch one in.

In the 40th minute, Lucas Bartlett would get on the end of a Brandon Knapp free-kick, but the graduate student defender just could not get the header past Andreas Nota.

In the 43rd minute on another free-kick opportunity, Matt Chandler’s header would go just wide.

The one opportunity Seton Hall had in the opening half was on a corner kick with Jared Juleau having to head the ball off the line as a header came in towards the goal.

In the second half, it was more of the same with the Johnnies controlling the play and generating chance after chance.

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In the 87th minute, Seton Hall would go down to 10 men as defender Eden O’Leary received his second yellow card of the night and was sent off. It meant St. John’s would play extra time with a man advantage.

However, the crossbar of the Pirate net would make for the team being reduced to 10 men as Knapp hit the crossbar on two separate occasions in overtime. Take a look here:

Both fantastic shots, just incredibly unlucky not to see them go in. Despite generating chance after chance, the game would end in a scoreless draw and both teams would have to settle for a point apiece.

The draw almost feels like a loss for St. John’s given the way they controlled the game. The shots stats don’t even account for some of the chances that could be argued should have been finished off to give the Red Storm the win along with the other times they hit the woodwork.

St. John’s soccer with daunting task ahead

Plus, it hurts that the Johnnies dropped points here as now looming up next is a trip to No.1 Georgetown on Wednesday at 2:00pm EST on the Big East Digital Network via FloSports.

An away trip to the Hoyas has been a legitimate house of horrors recently for St. John’s since they have not won in DC since 2018 and have lost the last three straight games to Georgetown.

This will be the true test for the Red Storm and whether they can get into the Big East Tournament. St. John’s currently has an 8-3-2 record overall (3-1-2, Big East), sitting at 4th place in the conference and the last qualifying spot for the Big East Tournament.

The Red Storm have 11 points in the Big East season, but Marquette and Butler are right behind them with ten and nine points, respectively.

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DePaul is also still lurking to a lesser extent, but still there with seven points with five games left.

The good news is that the Johnnies’ destiny is in their hands as they will face Marquette, Butler, and DePaul down the stretch of the conference season with two of those three matchups at home.

It is imperative for St. John’s to a least get a draw in the nation’s capital this week and then take care of business against the rest of their opponents.

A win on Wednesday would send a massive statement to the rest of the conference heading into the home stretch of the regular season.