The St. John’s basketball program has done something that has never been done before in the Big East. The Johnnies have won back-to-back outright conference regular season and tournament championships after its 72-52 win over UConn on Friday night.
It was the Game of the Year in the league. The rubber match between the rivals after St. John’s beat the Huskies at Madison Square Garden earlier and UConn routed the Storm by 32 points in Hartford.
None of that mattered on this night. It was further proof that the league belongs to St. John’s now.
After St. John’s built its largest lead of the game at the time, 47-29, early in the second half, the Huskies finally woke up. It rattled off a 13-2 run to trim the Red Storm lead to seven, 49-42, the smallest it had been since the 15;55 mark of the first half.
After a Red Storm timeout, it would score five straight points on a jumper by Bryce Hopkins and 3-pointer from Zuby Ejiofor, which jumped a 7-1 that got the lead to 13 points.
The exclamation point was dropped on a block from Ejiofor and windmill dunk by Dillon Mitchell with 9:08 left as the Johnnies took over.
Shortly after it was a 13-0 run by the Johnnies that sent The Garden into a frenzy. The first six points of the run were scored by Dylan Darling, and it was capped by a 3-pointer from Ejiofor.
The Most Outstanding Player of the Big East Tournament finished with 18 points, along with Hopkins. Oziyah Sellers ended the game with 14 points.
St. John’s defense held UConn to 33.9-percent shooting from the field and after the Red Storm missed its final 24 shots in the second meeting between the two teams, the Huskies missed its final 13 shots and did not make a field goal in the final 8:03.
The game started for St. John’s like its previous Big East Tournament games. After ripping off a 9-0 run against Providnce and an 8-0 run against Seton Hall, the Johnnies delivered a 10-0 run against the Huskies.
The Red Storm were overwhelming, opening up a lead that grew to as many as 17 points before taking a 13-point lead, 40-27, at halftime.
For the tournament, St. John’s never trailed. It led for 118:16 of a possible 120 minutes. It will await its fate on Sunday in the NCAA Tournament selection show.