The NCAA Tournament isn’t a pipe dream anymore. It’s fast becoming a very realistic possibility after another St. John’s victory, an 82-60 shellacking of rival Georgetown at the Garden on Sunday night.
ESPN bracketologist Joe Lunardi included St. John’s in his field. The regular season, however, still has five games to go, starting with Tuesday’s Garden matchup with Butler, followed by a trip to Philadelphia to face No. 9 Villanova on Saturday.
Haggerty for Harrison: High-scoring junior guard D’Angelo Harrison continued to come through in the clutch for St. John’s, scoring nine straight points at one juncture, including the biggest shot of the evening, a 3-pointer from the top of the arc to halt a 17-2 Georgetown run with 10:23 remaining. The lead didn’t get lower than eight the rest of the way.
Harrison has been huge in this run, coming up big whenever St. John’s has been up against it. He hit the go-ahead 3-pointer last Sunday against Creighton, made several big shots down the stretch in the Feb. 4 win at Providence. Coach Steve Lavin invoked Reggie Jackson’s name Sunday night to describe Harrison’s clutch gene.
At this point, he has to be considered a favorite for the Haggerty Award, given to the top player in the area. Manhattan’s George Beamon and Iona’s Sean Armand are candidates, but Harrison is leading the best local team in scoring, tallying 18.3 points per game, and he’s doing it when it matters most.
Jordan’s coming out party: We’ve seen glimpses, spurts of brilliance, even halves of impressive plays. Sunday night was an entire game’s worth, and the result was a career-high 24 point effort was that equal parts electrifying and memorable from freshman point guard Rysheed Jordan. There were dunks, acrobatic layups, nifty setups for teammates and three 3-pointers.
Simply, it was the best performance by a point guard at the Garden by the home team all season. (Yes, we’re including the Knicks.) When Jordan plays like this, he makes the game so much easier for his teammates, especially Harrison, creating open shots and opportunities. Odds are St. John’s will have the third Big East Rookie of the Year in as many seasons, with Jordan following JaKarr Sampson last year and Maurice Harkless two years ago.
Super Sampson: Speaking of Sampson, it was another impressive effort from the sophomore forward, who scored 12 points, and it was apropos that Georgetown was the opponent. On Jan. 4, Sampson was benched by Lavin, the only game he hasn’t started in his career.
The Akron, Ohio, product has reached double figures in eight of 11 contests since then, scoring 20 points in a big road win at Butler and dropping 21 more in a road victory at Providence.The accuracy in Sampson’s mid-range jumpshot has improved, he’s become more decisive with the ball and his assists numbers have risen.
He’s developed into a more efficient offensive player. He’s thinking less and reacting more. Even more impressive has been his defense, previously considered a weakness in his game.