St. John's ponders what it will take to make NCAA Tournament
Daniss Jenkins of St. John's shoots during a game against DePaul at UBS Arena on Tuesday. Credit: Errol Anderson
MILWAUKEE
The concepts and talking points about the tough road games remain the same at St. John’s: small details, a rebound or loose ball, keep the Red Storm from winning them. It’s the mental side of things you have to worry about in this moment.
St. John’s is facing two tough road games in a four-day stretch, starting with Saturday’s 6 p.m. Big East contest against No. 7 Marquette (17-5, 8-3) at Fiserv Forum. The next stop is Amica Mutual Pavilion on Tuesday against Providence. And if the Red Storm don’t stop perfecting the art of the near miss, the stop after that could be “first four out” status.
Daniss Jenkins was asked Thursday about this upcoming pair of contests and replied: “We definitely got to get one. We want to win both, obviously, but we know we need one.”
He is right. But only one month ago, an answer like that from any Red Storm player — especially the steely and determined Jenkins — would have been unimaginable.
It was exactly a month ago that St. John’s (14-9, 6-6) was off to its best conference start in more than two decades at 4-1, and the players couldn’t believe they’d lost a four-point heartbreaker at current No. 1 Connecticut.
The last three weeks of January was a dark time for the Red Storm. They lost five of six games, three of them road contests and two of them one-pointers to ranked foes. Tuesday’s wire-to-wire pounding of last-place DePaul gave them a breather, but could that rough stretch have dented the Storm?
Eye-opening as Jenkins’ answer was, the feeling here is that it’s an indication that St. John’s has realized that winning enough in the Big East to make the NCAA Tournament is going to be harder than expected. Less likely but possible: It indicates a loss of confidence. In other words, we’ll see if St. John’s is shaken or stirred (to play better).
St. John’s and the other teams in the middle of the Big East pack are evolving.
Providence just upset No. 19 Creighton and appears to have absorbed losing Bryce Hopkins. Since its 16-point loss at St. John’s, Butler has come on with road wins at Marquette and Creighton.And the Red Storm just witnessed how improved Xavier is since beating the Musketeers by 15 in December.
“I really feel [badly] about the games we let go because teams are playing better now. They’re not the same team [as] when we first played them,” Jenkins said. “I’m looking back saying we had these teams all beat, the teams that are playing good.”
“In the pack right now, everybody’s playing like starving dogs,” Rick Pitino said Thursday. “Providence is. Xavier is. Seton Hall and Butler [are].”
UConn had a 2-6 stretch last January and rebounded to win the national title. Nahiem Alleyne, who transferred to St. John’s, thinks the Red Storm can rebound the same way, saying “this team is very similar from a talent standpoint.” Asked if he sees St. John’s as an NCAA Tournament team, he replied, “Of course.”
And the makeup of the Red Storm looks right for a bounce-back. They are a veteran team with six players in their last college season. And they play with passion, from starters Jenkins and Chris Ledlum to reserves Zuby Ejiofor and Glenn Taylor Jr.
“We’re in good shape . . . going forward to teams we’re playing,” Pitino said. “We’re at Marquette. We’re at Providence. We’re at Butler. It’s a difficult road, certainly. And Creighton at home is going to be very difficult as well . . . We’ve got to get to 11 or 12 [Big East] wins, whatever it takes to get there.”
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.
