St. John's difficulties continue with loss to Georgetown at Garden
Sedee Keita of St. John's reacts late in the game during loss to Georgetown at Madison Square Garden on Sunday. Credit: Steven Ryan
The situation has gone from difficult to bad for St. John’s. Now the Red Storm’s goal has to be keeping it from becoming even worse.
The Storm had everything right in front of them on Sunday. They were playing a Georgetown team they already had beaten. The game was at Madison Square Garden, and 17,801 nearly filled the joint. And despite its recent travails, St. John’s was in position to move into third place in the Big East.
But the Red Storm showed only small stretches of the passion that at one point had them 14-1 and nationally ranked, while the Hoyas were inspired after a slew of close defeats. The Storm managed to pull it together and had a chance to go ahead or at least tie it in the final minutes, but they came up short, 89-78.
The Red Storm (15-5, 3-5) have lost four out of five and are staring down their most daunting stretch of the season. St. John’s has three straight away games against Creighton, No. 2 Duke and No. 12 Marquette. That stretch will give the Red Storm a shot to do everything from cement themselves as an NCAA Tournament probable to nosedive into a five-game slide.
Star guard Shamorie Ponds called the Georgetown game “must-win” on Friday. When asked what to make of this 1-4 stretch, he said: “I think we’ve got to regroup . . . I feel like as a team, we’ve all parted ways. We’re not [as] together as it was in the beginning.”
Georgetown (13-7, 3-4) shot 13-for-27 on three-pointers — what St. John’s coach Chris Mullin called “the difference in the game” — and turned seven offensive rebounds into 14 points.
Josh LeBlanc made both ends of a one-and-one to give the Hoyas a 79-73 lead with 2:08 to play, but Ponds hit two free throws, Justin Simon blocked a shot and Ponds scored on a driving layup on which goaltending was called to move St. John’s within two points.
On the ensuing possession, St. John’s caught Georgetown’s Greg Malinowski in a trap just over midcourt, and LJ Figueroa snared his pass. He opted to pull up for a potential go-ahead three-pointer and missed. Sedee Keita tried for a tip-in from the left side that didn’t fall and Simon tried a tip-in from the right side that didn’t drop, either.
Georgetown’s Jessie Govan emerged from a battle for the ball and found Mac McClung for a breakaway dunk with 1:11 left to begin a game-ending 10-1 run.
“We were fighting back and playing hard. We tried to get the tip-in — we couldn’t,” Mustapha Heron said. “[Figueroa’s three-pointer was] a shot we would have taken — if you make that shot, it’s a different game. We didn’t take it as a bad shot. We were trying to claw back, and that’s a shot we’ve seen him hit before.
“At the end of the day, it doesn’t come down to one possession. We came out for the first half and there were a couple spurts where we were just going through the motions, so that’s how we put ourselves in that position. That possession is what it is: It could have gone either way. We put ourselves in that position long before that possession ever came.”
Ponds had 21 points, Heron 18 and Figueroa 14 for St. John’s, but Marvin Clark II was 3-for-15 from the floor and Simon was 2-for-11.
McClung, who was sidelined with an ankle injury for the Storm’s overtime win at Georgetown on Jan. 5, had 25 points. Queens product Govan had 20 points and nine rebounds.
“It’s no emergency,” Mullin said. “We’ll regroup and play well for the rest of the year like we have.”
Of the challenging stretch ahead, Ponds said: “I wouldn’t say we’re desperate. We’ve got a three-game stretch, three tough games, and we have to take them one game at a time. We know we can win. We just have to get back to the winning ways.”
Roger Rubin returned to Newsday in 2018 to write about high schools, colleges and baseball following 20 years at the Daily News. A Baseball Hall of Fame voter since 2011, he has covered 13 MLB postseasons and 14 NCAA Final Fours.
