St. John's University Athletics
Globetrotters Trip Red Storm in Exhibition, 86-61
11/8/2002 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
NEW YORK, N.Y. -- For the first 10 minutes of the St. Johns mens basketball exhibition opener at Madison Square Garden on Friday night, you might have thought they were playing the Washington Generals, the long-time patsy of the Harlem Globetrotters.
The Red Storm opened the game up by scoring the first 11 points. Four different players scored baskets, including a pair by senior All-American candidate Marcus Hatten (Baltimore, Md.) and the St. Johns defense that head coach Mike Jarvis figured would lead to excitement on the offensive end was doing just that.
The older and experienced Globetrotters - whose roster includes former NBA standouts such as Cedric Ceballos, Olden Polynice and Todd Day - got hot as the first half grew older and quickly erased the opening deficit. They went into halftime with a 13-point advantage and went on to beat St. Johns, 86-61, in front of 13,506 fans at the Worlds Most Famous Arena.
The Red Storm came out on fire, starting the game with an 11-0 outburst over the first 3:06. Graduate student Anthony Glover (Bronx, N.Y.) hit a baseline jumper 45 seconds into the game and a free throw from senior Andre Stanley (Brooklyn, N.Y.) gave St. Johns a 3-0 lead.
After Stanley picked up a steal, he fed a darting Hatten, whose layup gave St. Johns a 5-0 lead. Sophomore Eric King (Brooklyn, N.Y.) followed with a steal and raced from midcourt for a dunk as the lead grew to 7-0. A tip-in from Glover and a Hatten layup, on an assist from Stanley, gave St. Johns an 11-0 at the 16:54 mark.
The Globetrotters, led by the hot shooting of Ceballos and former Baylor standout Aundre Branch, quickly got back in the game. After a three from Alex Sanders got Harlem on the board, Ceballos and Branch hit back-to-back layups, cutting the margin to 16-7.
A basket from freshman hTim Doyle (Merrick, N.Y.) pushed the St. Johns lead back to nine points, 20-11, at the 10:08 mark, but the Globetrotters proceeded to score 15 unanswered points over the next 3:19, taking a 26-20 lead on a Ceballos layup. The Red Storm managed to close the gap down to two points, 26-24, on a put-back dunk from junior center Curtis Johnson (Norfolk, Va.), but Branch hit a pair of three-pointers in the final minutes, keying a 15-4 spurt, as the Globetrotters took a 41-28 lead at the break.
The Red Storm came out strong again to start the second half, scoring the first six points on a pair of baskets from Hatten and one from Stanley which cut the margin to 44-35. The Globetrotters continued their hot shooting, with Branch hitting a pair of free throws and a layup and Ceballos connecting on a three-point play, to make it 51-35 with 15:45 to play. An 11-2 run over a 2:33 span, capped by an alley-oop from Brandon Dean, gave the Globetrotters a 62-39 lead and put the game away.
Hatten led St. Johns, scoring 17 points, with four rebounds, three assists and two steals, while Glover finished with 11 points and seven boards. Stanley scored six points, grabbed two boards and had two steals; junior transfer Grady Reynolds (Abbeyville, Ala.) added six points, two boards and two assists; Doyle had five points, four boards and two assists; junior Kyle Cuffe (Bronx, N.Y.) scored five points and added seven boards; King finished with five points; Johnson added four points; and sophomore guard Tristan Smith (Amityville, N.Y.) chipped in two points.
St. Johns shot 33.3 percent from the field (22-of-66), but was 0-of-9 from outside the arc. They hit 39.4 percent of their shots in the first half (13-of-33), and 27.3 percent (9-of-33) in the second half. They connected on 54.8 percent of their free throws (17-of-31).
Branch led the Globetrotters with 22 points, while Ceballos added 19 points. Dean finished with 10 points, and former St. Johns guard Chudney Gray added five points, five boards and four assists.
The Red Storm conclude their exhibition season next Friday, November 15, hosting an Israeli pro team at Alumni Hall in Jamaica, Queens.