St. John’s Downs DePaul In Romp On Road

 

Zuby Ejiofor slams one home. @StJohnsBball.

The St. John's Red Storm hit the road on Wednesday night, and put together a dominating performance to down DePaul, 82-58.

St. John's, ranked No. 10 in the nation in this week's AP poll, improved to 23-4 overall and 14-2 in Big East Conference play. This was their sixth win on the road against a Big East opponent.

The 14 Big East wins are the most for St. John's since the 1998-99 season.

The Red Storm are now firmly in first place in the Big East, with a 2 1/2 game lead on Marquette and Creighton, who are both 11-4 in conference play. 

St. John's lit it up in this one, as they shot 46.4 percent, or 32-69, shooting, and a season-best 42.9 percent, or 9-21, from behind the arc.

This game was competitive out of the gate, as it was tied at 20 with 8:23 left in the first half when St. John's took over with an 11-0 run over the next three minutes and five seconds capped by a Simeon Wilcher three-pointer.

That built out to a 16-2 run when Zuby Ejiofor slammed one home at the 2:02 mark to make it 36-22 St. John's.

The Red Storm took a 41-25 lead into halftime, after an opening 10 minutes in which they shot 48.6 percent, or 17-35, from the field, and 7-12, or 58.3%, from behind the arc.

It didn't take long into the second frame for St. John's to open up a 21-point edge, at 50-29, on a Kadary Richmond fast-break layup at the 16:59 mark.

That lead would build up to 25 points, 70-45, when Aaron Scott made a hook shot with 6:53 remaining, and they led by as many as 27, at 82-55, on a pair of Sadiku Ibine Ayo free throws with 1:10 remaining.

St. John's had their usual balanced scoring attack, led by Deivon Smith, who had 18 points on 7-17 shooting, including 3-5 from behind the arc, with five assists, four rebounds, and two steals. 

Kadary Richmond had 17 points (8-14 FG) and nine rebounds, narrowly missing a double-double, with five assists and a steal. Sadiku Ibine Ayo had 15 points (5-9 FG, 3-5 threes), with five rebounds, two assists, and a steal. Zuby Ejiofor had 13 points (4-7 FG) and nine rebounds, just missing a double-double, with three assists and a steal.

PITINO POSTGAME: St. John's Head Coach Rick Pitino addressed the media after the game, and he opened with this statement: “Well, we were in tough shape tonight. I’m real proud of Kadary Richmond tonight because he had the same injury that RJ [Luis Jr.] did, and he just gutted out practice and gutted out in the game, he played great. He's shown his great playing ability. Now he's shown his toughness. Sadiku [Ibine Ayo] gave us a big lift with RJ out, gave us a tremendous lift. He deserves it. He's the biggest cheerleader on the team for the other guys. He epitomizes everything great about the word team. Sadiku played terrific, he gave us 13 points in the first half and had five rebounds, two assists, which is shocking. It's great. The guys were great tonight. We were really banged up, really injured, and we came through. Proud of Kadary’s leadership, great basketball player, 17 [points], nine [rebounds], five [assists], with a pulled groin. So, if anybody questions his toughness, I can tell you right now, not only the practice, but he’s a physically tough young man.”

On the three-point shooting tonight: “The thing I'm happy with is we are taking the three now and not counting misses. That's taking a leap for us, not only making it, but taking them the right way. It was a pleasure to see that tonight, the way we shot it, the way we played, the way we rebounded. We did a lot of really good things being an injured basketball team.”

 

On Ruben Prey’s performance against DePaul: “I think Ruben played terrific tonight. Gave us a lot of great energy. He was good. We said, next man up.”

 

On the win against DePaul: “They did an excellent job of moving the basketball offensively. You know, we get 17 assists and you're shooting high percentages. It's a good thing. We didn't turn it over much, so real proud of this victory. We made sure we didn't take anybody lightly. We knew DePaul could beat us and we brought it the right way.”

 

On the status of this year’s team and building a culture at St. John’s: “I'm happy with the team. We're feeling good because we work hard. I think they're getting it, this team. It all started last year, building the culture. We owe Joel [Soriano] and [Daniss Jenkins] and [Chris Ledlum], Jordan Dingle and [Nahiem Alleyne], we owe them a lot. They established the culture we were trying to build, and these guys are taking it to a new level. They always talk about the second year, but the first year is the ones that established the culture. We owe them a lot for establishing that and now we’re taking great pride in what they're doing.”

 

On Chris Mullin complimenting him earlier this week: “I've known Chris as a young man, known him as a pro. Chris Mullin is what St. John's is about. He's the most famous player in the history of the school. He's someone that everybody looks up to for what he's accomplished. So, he is St. John's, and I take it as a high compliment because all the players in St. John's history, this is their home. We want them all back. We want them part of the program. I hope we do some great things because they made it happen and we hope we can get it back to that level.”

 

On Kadary Richmond: “[Kadary Richmond] doesn't turn the ball over. He makes great decisions. He's always looking up the floor and always trying to advance the ball, which is great. He’s has a great mid-range game. He's improved his free throw shooting in his second part of the season. But look, he played on a bad groin and he played almost 29 minutes, with nine rebounds, five assists and no turnovers. He's been brilliant.”