Kadary Richmond's jumper with three seconds left gives St. John's eighth win in row
St. John's Red Storm guard Kadary Richmond shoots a pull-up jumper to score the game-winning shot with three seconds left against the Providence Friars in a Big East men’s basketball game at Madison Square Garden on Saturday. Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
When St. John’s landed Kadary Richmond via the transfer portal, it certainly envisioned a game like Saturday afternoon’s against Providence.
Fifteenth-ranked St. John’s went ahead by 19 points with 10:05 left, but it unimaginably turned into a tie score with 32.3 seconds to play.
Enter Richmond.
The former Seton Hall star and All-Big East first-teamer, rated as the No. 1 player in the 2024 transfer class by multiple outlets, had been ascending of late. But his true St. John’s signature moment arrived in the Red Storm’s 68-66 Big East in front of 19,196 at Madison Square Garden.
Richmond used a screen from Zuby Ejiofor, found space at the elbow and elevated just in front of the free-throw line, nailing the winning pull-up jumper with three seconds left.
“It felt very good,” Richmond said. “Coaches, my teammates, they believed in me to give me the ball at the end of the game. And we executed the play, and I made a big-time shot.”
A half-court heave at the buzzer by Providence guard Bensley Joseph, whose three-pointer had tied it at 66 with 32.3 seconds left, missed as St. John’s (19-3, 10-1) survived for its eighth straight win.
Richmond scored a season-high 24 points, shot 10-for-14 and flirted with a triple-double with eight rebounds and eight assists. He entered the game 4-for-22 from three-point range but went 2-for-2 Saturday.
“I think he’s playing really good basketball, and we were going to win it or lose it with Kadary’s shot or his pass,” St. John’s coach Rick Pitino said. “So 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. He goes right like this, ‘My fault’ . . . The other guys, if they admit to one fault, it’d be a miracle. But Kadary owns up to everything, and I’m real proud of that. He had a great, great night.”
Said Providence coach Kim English: “He’s a great, great player. He’s improved, and I think he’s a gamer. He loves the moment, and he did things he did last season during the game.”
RJ Luis Jr. had 19 points and eight rebounds and Ejiofor added 13 points. Guard Deivon Smith, who missed three of St. John’s previous four games with a right shoulder injury, had three points and shot 1-for-10 in 28:07.
St. John’s continued its best start since the 1985-86 season, when it began 20-2, and its strongest start to Big East play since the 1984-85 season, when it went 15-1.
Providence (11-11, 5-6) made 12 three-pointers, the most St. John’s has allowed in Big East play. Guard Jabri Abdur-Rahim scored a season-high 27 points and shot 8-for-11 from outside the arc. Long Island Lutheran alum Jayden Pierre had 11 points and six assists.
After St. John’s grabbed a 53-34 lead 9:55 into the second half on Richmond’s three-point play, Providence scored 27 of the next 36 points and made nine of its next 12 shots. The Friars inched within one on Abdur-Rahim’s eighth three-pointer, which made it 62-61 with 2:21 left.
“Bottom line is, they put on a shooting exhibition that you don’t see very often,” Pitino said. “You got to give them a lot of credit. They can shoot you out with great range.”
Luis made one free throw with 1:59 left and another with 1:26 to play to give St. John’s a 64-61 lead. Pierre’s layup cut it to 64-63 with 59 seconds remaining, but Luis hit a pull-up jumper to make it 66-63 with 38 seconds left before Joseph’s tying three.
After Abdur-Rahim’s four-point play cut the Friars’ deficit to 31-28 with 16:54 left, the Red Storm had an extended 22-6 stretch to take their largest lead at 19 points. Luis hit a three-pointer with 16:20 left to spark an 11-0 run as part of the sequence.
St. John’s held a 25-21 halftime lead despite having a 5:44 scoring drought in the middle of the half and shooting only 29.4%.
“I don’t think my guys understand me,” Pitino said. “I’m really unhappy with them because that was a losing — not effort — that was a losing way to play defense at the end of the game.
“ . . . They think I’m going to jump up and down and congratulate [them], ‘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.”
Ben Dickson joined Newsday’s high school sports staff in 2023 after graduating from Maryland, where he covered several of the Terrapins' teams.
