The St. John’s basketball team hasn’t played its best this season although its best has not been needed yet, however, Tuesday night in Cincinnati was pretty close to a complete game from the Johnnies.
Xavier scored the first basket of the game and never led again in an 82-72 Red Storm victory.
“For 37 minutes tonight, that’s the best basketball we’ve played this season,” Rick Pitino said.
“Getting road wins in this conference is not easy,” he continued, despite his team making it look easy with a relentless effort and pursuit of the ball on both ends of the court.
Kadary Richmond set the tone early, scoring the first six points of the game for the Red Storm and making his first three shots. It was a new look from Richmond this year as he carried over the momentum he created in the final six minutes of the victory over Butler.
He was aggressive and determined while attacking a porous Xavier defense.
“I was going out there and playing basketball,” Richmond said as he finished with 12 points, four rebounds, six assists, and three steals.
St. John’s defense was stifling holding a Xavier (9-7, 1-4 Big East) offense that entered the game shooting 39.8-percent from 3-point range to just 4-of-18 (22.2-percent) and domaining the backboards, winning the rebounding battle by 20, 50-30, and pulling down 20 offensive rebounds.
The Johnnies (13-3, 4-1 Big East) built a 14-point lead in the first half before Xavier made its run entering halftime, cutting the margin to four, 41-37. It felt all too similar to the Johnnies’ loss against Creighton last week, but its lesson was learned and the Storm would not let history repeat itself.
Zuby Ejiofor recorded a block that led to a layup followed by a steal and dunk by Aaron Scott. It was just the jumpstart St. John’s needed to begin the half as the lead eventually ballooned to as many as 18 points in the second half as a smattering of boos echoed throughout the Cintas Center.
Five different players reached double figures for St. John’s, including 18 points from Ejiofor and RJ Luis while all 12 of Scott’s points came in the second half.
It sets up another fascinating matchup for the Red Storm, hosting Villanova (10-5, 3-1 Big East) on Saturday night (7:00 p.m. ET, CBS Sports Network) inside Madison Square Garden for its first game in the venue since November 17.