St. John's University Athletics
Red Storm Travels to Kansas for Sunday Matinee
12/5/2015 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
LAWRENCE, KAN. - After winning its fifth game in a row on Thursday at home against Sacred Heart, the Red Storm will hit the road this weekend, traveling to Lawrence, Kan., for a matchup with the Jayhawks at historic Allen Fieldhouse.
QUICK HITS Trailing late in the third quarter to the Pioneers on Thursday, the Red Storm closed the game on a 23-6 run and moved to 5-1 on the season with a 67-54 victory. Three members of the Red Storm finished in double figures, led by Aliyyah Handford with a season-high 24 points. The senior from Newark, N.J., also grabbed five boards, dished out four assists, recorded two blocks and surrendered only one turnover in 38 minutes of action. Danaejah Grant narrowly missed her second double-double of the year, tallying 17 points and nine rebounds in addition to three assists and a pair of steals. Freshman Akina Wellere had the best game of her young career against the Pioneers, registering 17 points of five-of-10 shooting, including a three-for-seven effort from beyond the arc.
With her 24 points on Thursday, Handford bumped her career total to 1,620 points, becoming just the fifth player in St. John's history to eclipse the 1,600-point mark. The senior guard is also on the cusp of joining another elite group of Red Storm greats, as she is just one steal away from becoming the seventh player in program history to record 200 steals over the course of a career.
Averaging 19.2 points per contest through six games, Danaejah Grant currently tops the BIG EAST and ranks 47th nationally in scoring. The senior guard from Piscataway, N.J., has reached double figures in all six games for the Red Storm and boasts two 20-plus efforts, a 28-point showing at UC Irvine and a 27-point outburst in the win over No. 18/17 USF. For her efforts, Grant was named the BIG EAST Player of the Week on Monday.
After dropping the 2015-16 season opener on the road at UCLA, the Red Storm has been on fire, rattling off five-consecutive wins with an average margin of victory of 12.0 points per game. Over that stretch, the Red Storm has shot a blistering 48.1 percent from the floor and picked up a win against No. 18/17 USF, the team's first triumph over a nationally ranked opponent this season.
SCOUTING KANSAS
The Kansas Jayhawks enter Sunday's contest with a record of 4-2 on the season, including a 67-54 win over BIG EAST opponent Creighton on Wednesday night.
The Jayhawks are led on offense by Lauren Aldridge, a 5-7 sophomore guard from Marshfield, Mo., who is averaging 14.0 points and 3.3 assists per game. A dangerous three-point shooter, Aldridge has converted on 44 percent of her attempts from beyond the arc this season.
Two other Jayhawks are averaging double digits on the season, Kylee Kopatich (10.7 ppg) and Caelynn Manning-Allen (10.3 ppg). Manning-Allen is also the team's leading rebounder at 7.3 boards per game.
ST. JOHN'S VS. KANSAS- THE SERIES
The Jayhawks and the Red Storm have only met on one other occasion in the history of the two programs.
That contest occurred all the way back in 1993, when Kansas defeated St. John's by a score of 64-53 in Queens.
