St. John’s Marches into the BIG EAST Tournament Semifinals

Thursday, March 14

New York, N.Y. (Madison Square Garden)

2:30 p.m.

St. John's University

20-12,11-9Big East

No. 4 Seton Hall

20-12,13-7Big East

St. John's (NY)

Seton Hall

St. John’s Marches into the BIG EAST Tournament Semifinals

3/14/2024 6:58:00 PM | Men's Basketball

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Red Storm defeats Seton Hall, 91-72, to earn first semifinal berth since 2000

NEW YORK – For the first time since 2000, the fifth-seeded St. John's men's basketball team (20-12) has advanced to the BIG EAST Tournament semifinals after taking down fourth-seeded Seton Hall (20-12), 91-72, on Thursday at Madison Square Garden.

RJ Luis Jr. scored a team-high 18 points to help lead the Johnnies to their largest margin of victory in a BIG EAST Tournament quarterfinal since March 12, 1993, when St. John's downed Boston College, 76-56. St. John's center Joel Soriano registered his 14^th double-double of the season, finishing with 14 points and 12 rebounds to go with four assists.

The Red Storm's offense was clicking on all cylinders on Thursday as the team reached the 90-point mark in a tournament game for just the sixth time in program history. St. John's shot 51.6 percent (32-62 FG) from the field, hit eight 3-pointers and knocked down 19-of-20 attempts (95.0 pct) at the free-throw line.

Nahiem Alleyne helped Luis anchor the team's production off the bench, as the graduate student scored 14 points, shooting a perfect 5-for-5 from the field with a trio of 3-pointers. Jordan Dingle (14 points), Daniss Jenkins (11 points) and Chris Ledlum (11 points) rounded out the six Red Storm players in double figures.

After Seton Hall built its largest lead, 13-8, just under four minutes into the contest, Luis helped power a 10-4 spurt that gave St. John's its first advantage. The 6-foot-7 wing from Miami finished in the paint three times within the next three minutes and pushed the Johnnies ahead 18-17 with a layup at 11:43.

Minutes later, Al-Amir Dawes buried a 3-pointer to reclaim what would prove to be Seton Hall's final advantage of the game, 24-23, at 9:08. The Red Storm responded with an 8-0 run and never looked back. Zuby Ejiofor and Alleyne buried back-to-back threes before Luis' steal and layup on the break sent the Johnnies ahead 31-24 at 6:59.

The Red Storm built its lead as large as nine in the first half with Soriano's jumper at 5:12. However, Seton Hall closed the gap by scoring seven-straight points to cut its deficit to 39-38 with 2:50 to play before the break.

Soriano answered with a putback and jumper down the stretch while Luis knocked down a jumper of his own at the buzzer to send St. John's into the locker room with a 45-40 edge. Luis had 10 of his 18 points in the first 20 minutes of action.

The Red Storm scored the first six points of the second half to build its first double-digit advantage of the contest. Dingle, Jenkins and Glenn Taylor Jr. sank consecutive buckets to go up 51-40 at 17:54. Defensively, the Johnnies stifled Seton Hall in the early going of the second half, holding the Pirates without a field goal nearly five minutes into the stanza.

The Johnnies delivered another blow going with 7-0 run within 40 seconds that was capped by a jumper in transition by Alleyne and a corner three from Dingle to send St. John's ahead by 15 with 9:11 to play.

After Seton Hall whittled the Red Storm's advantage to eight with 5:55 to go, St. John's outscored the Pirates 16-5 the rest of the way. With the win, the Johnnies extended their win streak to six games, matching the program's longest streak against BIG EAST competition since the 2010-11 campaign.

Dawes led the Pirates with a game-high 22 points and hit four 3-pointers. Dylan Addae-Wusu had 15 points and three triples for Seton Hall.

St. John's returns to "The World's Most Famous Arena" on Friday for its semifinal contest with top-seeded Connecticut (29-3). Tip-off is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. FOX will carry the national telecast.