The St. John’s basketball team is good, there’s no debating that, but the Johnnies have a chance to be special if they get the version of Deivon Smith that showed up against DePaul on Tuesday night.
Smith was like a race car.
He was so much faster than everyone else on the floor. He was in passing lanes defensively before the ball was thrown and it wouldn’t be long until the Red Storm added to its lead off of the turnover, resulting in a 28-point victory.
It was a focus of St. John’s to get its guard going entering the contest as Rick Pitino inserted him back into the starting lineup for the first time since November 24 against Georgia. His incident during that game on the bench is distantly in the rearview mirror after serving a one game suspension and now it’s about getting better and making a charge to the top of the Big East standings.
“The pace picks up,” Pitino said of Smith on Monday when he is in the game. “When Deivon is out of the game, we don't play at that pace. It just creates more opportunities to offensive rebound and creates more opportunities to dribble penetrate. And those are some of the things we do well.”
His effort led to nine points, six rebounds, eight assists, and five steals. St. John’s outscored DePaul by 24 points in the 27 minutes he was on the floor.
“He’s not only very fast, but a very smart young man,” Pitino explained after the victory. “He ignites you because he rebounds the ball well. He's unselfish.”
Smith’s outstanding play is not only noticeable from the coaching staff, but his teammates feed off his energy too.
“We see what he could do every day, and just to have the environment that we're in, especially being at home, and then him just hopping into his bag like he usually does,” Simeon Wilcher said after St. John’s victory.
“It just it turns everybody up and gives everybody a little boost of confidence.”
Deivon Smith is now averaging 9.4 points, 5.8 rebounds. 5.1 assists, and 1.8 steals per game while shooting 44.4-percent from the field and 37.9-percent from 3-point range, a perceived weakness as he entered St. John’s.
His game seems perfectly suited to make an immediate impact during conference play.
“I think it's just my game. Playing hard,” Smith said. “I know I have a quick first step, so I'm always trying to blow past my defender.”
“Sometimes it seems like I'm always playing super-fast because I rebound a lot and I start to break a little quicker. I think playing at that fast pace gives us an advantage and it works. We score points quickly, get shooters second chance shots and stuff like that. So, I think that’s an advantage and a plus that I bring to this team.”
St. John’s (9-2, 1-0 Big East) is hoping that advantage Deivon Smith brings remains with them for its first true road game of the season on Friday night (8:00 p.m. ET, FOX) against Providence (7-5, 1-0 Big East).