Saturday, February 1, 2025

St. John's Survives Persistent Providence Attack At Packed Garden

 

The celebration was on at the end of a chaotic afternoon at Madison Square Garden. Photo by Jason Schott.


The St. John's Red Storm survived a vigorous comeback down the stretch to outlast the Providence Friars, 68-66, on Saturday afternoon in front of 19,196 fans at Madison Square Garden.

St. John's, who is the 15th-ranked team in the country, improved to 19-3 overall, including a 10-3 mark in Big East play.

The Red Storm ended the day in sole first place in the Big East Conference after Marquette lost to UConn, 77-69, on Saturday night to fall to 9-2 in conference play. St. John’s host Marquette Tuesday night at 6:30 p.m. at Madison Square Garden.

St. John’s has now won eight straight league games for the first time since February 1 to to March 2, 1992, in Lou Carnesecca's last season at the helm.

This game started anticlimactically as there was a 15-minute delay having to do with an issue with the shot clock, and even though St. John's Head Coach Rick Pitino denied it was a factor on the teams, St. John's led 25-21 at halftime despite shooting 29.4 percent from the field in the first half.

St. John's found their rhythm on offense in the second half, as they went on an 11-0 run capped by a Zuby Ejiofor dunk, followed by a layup on a fast break to go up 42-28 at the 13:57 mark.

Zuby Ejiofor looking back to see that his layup went in. First of three photos by Jason Schott.

The celebration begins when it went in.



That lead would expand to 53-34, as Kadary Richmond completed a three-point play with 10:05 left

By this point, one would think, this likely won't go down to the wire like when these teams played in Providence on December 20 when St. John's won it on a buzzer beater by Zuby Ejiofor.

Providence got back into it with an 11-2 run to make it 55-45 St. John's with 6:00 remaining. Their fans started really making some noise when Jabri Abdur-Rahim buried a three-pointer to pull within six, at 59-53, with 4:31 left.

Just over two minutes later, Abdur-Rahim buried another three to make it a one-point game, 62-61, with still an eternity, 2:19 left.

The Providence bench raced out to greet Jabri Abdur-Rahim after they pulled within one. Photo by Jason Schott. 

On the ensuing possession for St. John's, RJ Luis Jr. got to the free throw line, but he only made one out of two. Then, after he grabbed an offensive rebound on the Miss, he got back to the line for a one-and-one and missed that. Luis Jr. then got a third chance to cash in at the free throw line when he was fouled at 1:26, and he only made one of two of them, so after all that, it was still a one-possession game, at 64-61.

Jayden Pierre drained a layup with 59 seconds left, and Luis matched him with a pull-up jumper outside the paint at the 38-second mark to make it 66-63.

Then, just five seconds later, Bensley Joseph drained a three-pointer to finally bring Providence all the way back and tie the game at 66.

St. John's would have 33 seconds to get the winning basket, and would be able to take it all the way to the final seconds if they wished.

That's just what they did, as they took their time, and found Richmond at the top of the key for a jumper, and he buried it with just three seconds left to make it 68-66.

Providence had to take it out at the baseline, and they raced just past midcourt when Joseph got a good look, and he fired in what would have been the game-winning three-pointer, but it rimmed out, sending the St. John's fans into a frenzy.

St. John's players raced to the court after they survived and won. Photo by Jason Schott.


St. John's was led by Kadary Richmond, who had 24 points on 10-14 shooting, including 2-2 from behind the arc, with eight assists, eight rebounds, and three steals.

RJ Luis Jr. had 19 points (7-14 FG, 3-6 threes) and eight rebounds. Zuby Ejiofor had 13 points (5-12 shooting), with five rebounds, one assist and one steal.

Providence was led by Jabri Abdur-Rahim, who poured in 27 points off the bench, on 9-12 shooting, including 8-11 from behind the arc, with seven rebounds and two assists.

PITINO POSTGAME: St. John's Head Coach Rick Pitino addressed the media after the game, and he opened with this statement: “Well, first I want to congratulate Providence. That was quite a shooting display, especially [Jabri Abdur] Rahim, that they put on. They were down 15 or 16 points, never quit, dug in and made incredible shots. Prior to that, we had them at three made threes in the first half, and then we just kept breaking our defensive routine of what we're supposed to do. So they deserve all the credit. 

"I don't think my guys understand me, I'm really unhappy with them because that was a losing - not effort - what was a losing way to play the defense at the end of the game. The number one thing we said is 'we're not going to back up, we're going to pick them up five, six feet past the three-point line, and not back up,' but because we're concerned about missing free throws and missing shots, it affected our defense down the stretch, and that's why I'm very disappointed. So, they think I'm going to jump up and down, congratulate you, what a great win, it's just the opposite. You lose games when you don't pay attention to your job, and they didn't pay attention to their job. So, we're very fortunate and very pleased we won, but very disappointed in the way we played down the stretch - not offensively, defensively."

On the defensive performance down the stretch: “We didn't do our job defensively. We have to focus on defense because we could have lost the game today by not doing our defensive job. It's always better to learn from winning than it is from losing, so we learned a valuable lesson.”

On Providence’s shot-making to get back in the game: “I think we didn't stick to the game plan of backing up; we turned our back to the corners. They shoot almost 40 percent from the corners, and they take almost eight threes a game. We didn't switch out, we gave up the corners, we backed up when they were coming down the court, take the three. Now look, they're a great shooting team, they put on a display. Rahim was 8-for-11, so we didn't do a good job of guarding him because we said, ‘Oh, he's way out of his range.’ No, he's not way out of his range. That's his range.”

On where he thinks the shift in the game occurred as Providence made their run: "Well, we kept not listening to the scouting report offensively and defensively. I'll give you an example, we run a pick-and-roll into a play on the weak side, and there's a guy, I said, if you don't break the foul line either with your dribble or getting below the foul line to catch it, they're going to go under pick-and-rolls, and all you have to do is beat the clock down, so we kept doing it. We didn't dribble down to the foul line, kept doing it, and it's all because they're thinking of the last shot they missed. So, we just had to win the game, they'll watch the film and learn from it, and we'll move forward to Marquette.” (who they play Tuesday night at 6:30 p.m. at Madison Square Garden)

On looking ahead to the Marquette game and UConn next Friday: "I can't tell you about Marquette, I'll study them tonight. I can't talk about the future. I can just talk about we played poorly tonight, happy we won, learn from our mistakes, but we have to stop talking about the future because I can't answer you honestly. I don't have the answer. I thought Georgetown (Tuesday) would go down to the last-second shot, we'd have to come back to win, and we were up 28 at halftime. So, I'm not good, if I was touting you in Vegas, you'd be down two million dollars."

On how he feels his team is playing: "I don't feel good right now because of the way we played the game. So, tomorrow, I'll have a much better attitude, be glad we won."

On Kadary Richmond: “He's playing really good basketball and we were going to win it or lose it with Kadary’s shot or his pass. He made a terrific shot. He was shooting the ball well all game. I'm really, really happy for him. The thing I love about Kadary is he owns up to his mistakes. Kadary owns up to everything, and I'm real proud of that. He had a great, great night.”

On Deivon Smith’s return from injury: “I think he's really rusty. He had two practices where he didn't shoot it well, but it's to be expected. He had six assists in the game, one turnover, three steals. That's to be expected. He didn't shoot it well in practice either. But I don't worry about Deivon. He's a pro. He'll come back, he listens, he'll do the right things.”



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