The chant coming from the pep band was an ironic one, if you really think about it.
“OVER-RATED!” a few scattered voices began to scream, as D’Angelo Harrison made the first free throw with 5.8 seconds left in the game, extending St. John’s lead over Creighton to three points.
“OVER-RATED!!!!” they crowed, as Harrison swished the second one, pushing the cushion to four, all but salting the game away, all but clinching the signature victory the Johnnies have searched for all season.
“OVER-RATED!!!!!!!!” they thundered, as the Bluejays threw a desperation heave downcourt, as Harrison plucked the ball out of the air like a free safety, as the reality of this 70-65 victory began to filter around Madison Square Garden, 6,739 people trying to sound like 20,000, trying to build a din equal to the moment.
Overrated? That isn’t the message St. John’s wants to send anywhere, to anyone. Through 23 games the Johnnies hadn’t beaten anyone inside the RPI Top 50, which is one of the first things against which they’ll be judged come Selection Sunday in 34 days. They had come close against Syracuse and Villanova, been right there the first time against Creighton, in Omaha, Neb., two weeks ago.
But 0-for-5 is 0-for-5.
And the difference between 0-for-5 and 1-for-6 is almost immeasurable. The Johnnies had already rescued their season, grinding back from 0-5 in the Big East, winning six out of seven. Now they have No. 9 in the RPI on their résumé. It isn’t enough, not yet. But it’s a damn good start, with plenty of season left.
“It feels great to get this out of the way,” said Sir’Dominic Pointer, the Johnnies’ junior swingman. “I think we’re finding our own little groove now. We’re hard to beat if we play like this.”
They’re especially difficult to contend with when Harrison plays as he did on offense, when Jakarr Sampson plays with the ferocity he did on defense. Harrison was 9-for-10 from the line, made the 3 that gave the Johnnies the lead for good; all Sampson did was suffocate Doug McDermott, who may well be the best amateur basketball player in the world.
“They did a great job of taking me away,” said McDermott, who still finished with 25 points but didn’t get a shot off in the game’s final 8 ½ minutes. “They did a great job of switching when I was coming off screens, they’re very disciplined. I give them a lot of credit.”
Said Sampson, bashfully: “I felt I did a good job holding him to his average.”
They have been an impossible team to figure out most of the year but that is the beauty of the long season: You don’t have to figure anything out by Thanksgiving, or by New Year’s. Only by March. And the Johnnies seem to be getting there with a few weeks to spare.
“We feel like we can beat anyone right now, the way we’re playing,” Sampson said, and that’s a good way to feel with the Big East Tournament coming here in four weeks, with seven games left between here and there. There’s still a lot of work left — will 5-2 get them on the bubble? Will 4-3 if one of the wins is Villanova?
But work has never been a problem with this group. They’ve never wanted for effort, just a payoff. Sunday night, MSG, they got one, they got a big one. And it was perfectly rated.