Marquette defeats foul-plagued St. John's
St. John's D'Angelo Harrison reacts after being called for an offensive foul against Marquette during the second half. (Jan. 11, 2012) Credit: AP
MILWAUKEE -- St. John's gamely fought through foul trouble for one of its stars, Moe Harkless, in the first half. The Red Storm wasn't as fortunate after the break with D'Angelo Harrison.
Harrison picked up three fouls in his four minutes in a rough second half, in which Darius Johnson-Odom came alive and helped No. 25 Marquette pull away for an 83-64 victory Wednesday night.
St. John's (8-8, 2-3 Big East) led by six when Harkless picked up his second foul with 9:10 left in the first half. The freshman sat out the rest of the half, but God'sgift Achiuwa's 13 points helped the Red Storm to a 32-31 edge at the break.
"Certainly we had a nice formula in the first half and not a lot tactically changed," St. John's acting coach Mike Dunlap said.
What changed was that Johnson-Odom started to attack the basket more after his two-point first half. He followed an inside hoop with a three-point play that drew Harrison's third foul with 17:20 left as the Golden Eagles (13-5, 2-2) took the lead for good at 40-36.
Only 17 seconds later, Harrison made a steal but charged into Jae Crowder for his fourth personal. Harrison sat nearly five minutes as Johnson-Odom kept getting into the lane and Marquette expanded the lead.
"I try to stay out of the foul trouble as much as I can," Harrison said. "I had some tough calls tonight."
Dunlap wasn't upset with Harrison's aggressiveness on the fourth foul, saying the freshman's decision-making will improve. "It was a real close call," Dunlap said. "He could have pulled up and shot a banker."
Five straight points by Johnson-Odom, capped by a three-pointer off a feed from Junior Cadougan, gave the Golden Eagles their first double-digit advantage, 54-44. Dunlap tried to create a spark by reinserting Harrison with 12:04 to go.
Unfortunately for the Storm, Harrison was called for another offensive foul 42 seconds later and incredulously went to the bench. All of his 10 points came in the first half. "When we lost D'Angelo, that hurt us in terms of being able to make a surge," Dunlap said.
Marquette used a 13-2 run to build a 69-47 lead after Harrison fouled out. Johnson-Odom had 18 points in the second half, when he shot 7-for-8.
"I didn't like how we played in terms of effort," Dunlap said of Marquette's 52-point second half.
The smaller Red Storm also was bullied by 290-pound Davonte Gardner, who had career highs of 22 points and 15 boards.
"I thought [Gardner] was the reason we won the game," coach Buzz Williams said. "I thought he was the reason we hung in there in the first half."
Achiuwa led St. John's with 20 points and seven boards, and Harkless scored 17. The Red Storm shot 40.7 percent and committed 11 of their 15 turnovers after the break.
