Through five Big East conference games and five losses, St. John’s has done a lot wrong. But it also has done some right.
The Red Storm have been in position to win four of the five contests; only the game against Georgetown was out of reach.
The Johnnies haven’t made the winning plays in crunch time they were expected to, and have nearly destroyed their NCAA Tournament hopes in getting off to their worst start in conference play in over a decade.
But despite the morose outlook and the woe-is-us mantra St. John’s fans have adopted, the season is not over.
Sure, Thursday’s double-overtime loss to Providence at Carnesecca Arena was gut-wrenching, as St. John’s had the ball with a chance to win at the end of regulation, the first overtime and the second. And the defeat the game before, at bottom-feeder DePaul, was hard to take, with the Red Storm coughing up a late four-point lead and failing to score over the final 3:02.
St. John’s (9-8, 0-5) still has 14 games to play, eight of them at home, nearly half a season left to change the narrative and prove the preseason hype was more than hot air.
“We just got to keep going,” said junior forward Sir’Dominic Pointer, the team’s heartbeat. “This is a long season and it’s not over yet.”
The Red Storm get another chance to right the ship Saturday evening back at Carnesecca Arena, when they will host Ivy League also-ran Dartmouth at 6 p.m. in their non-conference finale. The Johnnies are desperately in need of a win to boost their sagging confidence, their last victory coming over Columbia on Dec. 28.
A win would give them a 10-3 non-conference record, which would be the best in coach Steve Lavin’s tenure. St. John’s hasn’t defeated a power-conference competitor in those 10 wins, stockpiling victories over Columbia, Bucknell, Fordham and San Francisco instead, while suffering defeats to Penn State, Wisconsin and Syracuse.
In Lavin’s first year, which seems like a lifetime ago, St. John’s got off to a similarly poor start, beginning the season 11-8. Nobody was thinking that team would reel off eight wins in nine games and reach the NCAA Tournament for the first time in nine years. Odds are slim this team can duplicate that, but there is a precedent.
“The confidence is still there,” Pointer said. “We are a team that’s in a funk right now and we got to pull ourselves out of it. We have to find a way whether it’s getting in the gym extra or being more together. We have to find a way. That’s all it is. Our confidence is just fine. We just have to find a way to win.”