The St. John's basketball team turned in arguably its best performance of the season with one of its most indispensable players on the sidelines.
Chris Ledlum missed his second game of the year in Saturday's victory against Villanova due to an ankle sprain and could be out when the Red Storm face Providence on Wednesday night (6:30 p.m. ET, FoxSports1) inside Madison Square Garden.
Rick Pitino said it was "doubtful" that the 6-foot-6 forward would available for the Johnnies.
Ledlum hasn't practice in the last week and "stuggled" through a minor individual player development session, accoridng to Pitino.
Chris Ledlum has started in every game he has played for St. John's this season and is averaging 11.0 points, 8.0 rebounds, 1.9 assists, and 1.4 steals per game while shooting 41.7-percent from the floor and a career-high 35.9-percent from 3-point range.
The Harvard transfer suffered the injury during the second half of the Red Storm's loss against UConn on December 23 but still managed to finish the game. He would miss the Johnnies' next game against Hofstra on December 30 but returned to the court on January 2 when St. John's hosted Butler.
However, two minutes into the game, Ledlum aggravated the ankle injury and had to exit. He would return shortly and complete the game.
Pitino said he was "70-percent" going into the game against Butler but only "50-percent" when the Johnnies played Villanova and the main reason why he was held out.
Glenn Taylor Jr., after only playing eight seconds against Butler, returned to the starting lineup in Ledlum's absence against Villanova.
The injury is a low ankle sprain, as opposed to a much more severe high ankle sprain, but even when Chris Ledlum returns he will have to build his conditioning back up, according to the Hall of Famer.
Providence is also dealing with major injury issues as star forward Bryce Hopkins was ruled out for the remainder of the season after tearing his torn ACL against Seton Hall and freshman Garwey Dual appeared to injure his shoulder against Creighton, but returned in the second half.