St. John's coach Rick Pitino displeased with first-half play, but Red Storm has strong second half to pull away from Quinnipiac

Simeon Wilcher tilted his head back and screamed toward the ceiling of the old gym on Utopia Parkway as a wave of noise enveloped him.

In the span of 21 seconds, the sophomore guard had thrown down a one-handed hammer dunk and knocked down a three-pointer before bouncing once, twice, three times toward the student section to celebrate his accomplishments with 5,602 of his closest friends inside Carnesecca Arena on Saturday afternoon.

It was an instant of pure, unadulterated joy for all involved. Save for one person, who was not particularly overwhelmed by the performance of his team.

“Sim is a terrific basketball player [who] did a lot of good things, but the whole team tonight did not focus on their job,” Rick Pitino said after the Red Storm’s tougher-than-expected 96-73 win over Quinnipiac. “They had two bad practices [leading up to the game] and they paid [for it] in the first half. They didn’t look good in the first half, but they were good enough to overcome that and play a very good second half.”

St. John’s (2-0) outscored Quinnipiac 61-34 in the final 20 minutes after trailing 39-35 at halftime. The Red Storm missed 21 of 33 shots from the field, including seven three-point attempts, and committed seven turnovers in the opening 20 minutes.

For a team playing only its second real game of the season and its fourth overall — St. John’s played exhibition games against Rutgers and Towson — and with a coach still determining how to best deploy his players, it should not have been overly shocking that the Red Storm weren’t especially crisp in the first half. But what troubled Pitino was that his team’s details and decision-making were lacking.

“First play of the game, Zuby [Ejiofor] shoots a three. Everybody’s on the perimeter, you have no chance to rebound,” said Pitino, who also lamented St. John’s “underneath, out-of-bounds diamond defense” and its “white sideline out-of-bounds defense” that allowed the Bobcats to knock down eight three-pointers.

So why were the Red Storm able to pull away in the second half?

For one, a stronger defensive effort.

Quinnipiac missed 19 of 30 shots in the last 20 minutes, misfiring on 11 of 13 three-point attempts. The Red Storm also recorded six of their nine steals and three of their 10 blocked shots in the second half.

Which, in turn, led to St. John’s offense finding its rhythm. The Red Storm shot 20-for-38 in the second half.

RJ Luis Jr. was one of four Red Storm players to finish in double-figures. He had 24 points and 13 rebounds after being inserted into the starting lineup in place of an ailing Aaron Scott.

On Friday afternoon, Pitino announced he was going to have guards Wilcher, Deivon Smith and Kadary Richmond in the starting lineup and Luis was going to be with the reserves, although the decision was not based on the junior swingman punting a ball into the Carnesecca Arena stands in frustration late in the Red Storm’s season-opening 92-60 rout of Fordham on Monday night.

But Scott’s undisclosed illness forced Pitino to reconfigure his lineup. Luis joined Wilcher, Smith, Richmond and Ejiofor in the starting lineup.

“I want to apologize [for what happened] in the last game. It was very uncharacteristic of me,” Luis said. “I let my emotions get the best of me.”

Brady Dunlap scored 20 points and shot 6-for-8, including 5-for-7 from beyond the arc. Wilcher scored 13 of his 14 points in the second half and Smith finished with 13 points and 10 assists.

“Good teams know when to come out and finish great,” Dunlap said.

Ryan Mabrey led Quinnipiac (1-2) with 17 points. Paul Otieno had 12 and Jaden Zimmerman added 11.