The St. John’s men’s basketball team battled for their tournament lives versus Marquette in a double-overtime thriller on Saturday afternoon as the Red Storm came out victorious 91-90.
“I’m proud of our guys for coming into this hostile environment and having the toughness and resourcefulness to pull out a double-overtime victory,” St. John’s head coach Steve Lavin said. “This team has been through so many challenges both on and off the court so it’s nice to see the kids accumulate wins they deserve. This victory is an indication of how much we’ve matured as a basketball team.”
St. John’s and Marquette battled back forth all afternoon with one another as the game was tied 18 times and the lead changed 16 times. The Red Storm were down three points with 56 ticks left in double overtime. But the Johnnies all-time three-point leader D’Angelo Harrison stepped up with a 30 foot three point jumper to tie the game up at 90 apiece. A foul on freshman guard Rysheed Jordan with 19 seconds left sent him to the line with the game on the line. Jordan hit 1-of-2 free throws that proved to be the difference in Milwaukee.
“Big win for us,” Junior guard D’Angelo Harrison said. “But we got to forget about it after we get off the plane. We got to get ready for our next game. We’re on this one game win streak, but it’s only one game. It’s over. Now we got to get ready to go on another one game win streak.”
The Red Storm’s (20-11, 10-8) victory over the Golden Eagles (17-14, 9-9) locks up the fifth seed for the Johnnies in the Big East Tournament where they will be taking on the fourth seeded Providence Friars.
In the second half with 11 seconds left the Red Storm were up six and it looked like victory was in sight. But the Golden Eagles went on a 6-0 run in last 11 seconds set up by a Rysheed Jordan failed attempt to throw the ball off a Marquette players leg.
The first overtime ended with Marquette having a shot to win it, but Jordan made up for his mistake at the end of regulation by coming up with a huge block to send the game to
double overtime.
St. John’s had a strong shooting performance on the day shooting 34-for-67 (50.7 percent) behind 20 points from Rysheed Jordan, D’AngelHarrison, and JaKarr Sampson. Marquette shot 30-for-68 (44.1 percent) behind Davante Gardner’s 21 points and Todd Mayo’s 20 points.
