Game Notes & Preview: Providence (21-9, 9-8) at St. John’s (8-22, 1-16) 3/5/16

Where: Madison Square Garden – New York, NY

When: 12:30pm EST

How: FS1 (Dick Stockton & Tarik Turner)/WEEI 103.7 FM and Friars.com (John Rooke and Joe Hassett)/FriarTV

Game Notes

• Providence and St. John’s will meet for the 108th time on Saturday with the Red Storm leading the series, 60-47. The Friars are 16-32 in games played in New York. The first matchup between these two teams earlier this season was a comfortable, 83-65, win at the Dunkin’ Donuts Center on January 2nd.
• St. John’s is 8-22 (1-16) on the season. The Red Storm are led by Chris Mullin, who is in his 1st season at the helm of the St. John’s program. The Red Storm have had a rough first season under Mullin. He was faced with having to replenish nearly the entire roster after Steve Lavin’s departure back to television. The Red Storm are led in scoring by gradudate student Durand Johnson, who averages 11.9 points/game. Freshman Yankuba Sima is the leading rebounder, averaging 6.0 rebounds/game.
• The Friars dropped out of the the USA Today Coaches’ Poll this week after dropping out of the AP Top 25 a week ago. Providence got no votes in the AP Poll this week, but they got enough votes in the Coaches’ Poll to be 30th.
• Kris Dunn was honored on Senior Night, along with Junior Lomomba prior to Providence’s game against Creighton on March 2nd. Dunn recently became the 6th Friar to amass 200 career steals. He went over the 1,000 point mark on January 30th against Georgetown on a spectacular finish at the rim. His 1,132 career points ranks 33rd all-time at Providence and just 3 point behind Marty Conlon for 32nd. Dunn also has 521 assists (5th all-time), 471 rebounds and 204 steals (6th all-time). He is 1 steal behind Geoff McDermott for 5th. He is the only player in school history to have amassed 1,000 points, 500 assists, 400 rebounds and 200 steals in a career at Providence.
• Ed Cooley got his 100th career win at Providence on March 2nd against Creighton.
• Opening Line: Providence -8 at St. John’s 3/5/16

Game Preview

Providence just played their final home Big East game on Wednesday night against Creighton and they will travel to Madison Square Garden on Saturday to face the team they played in their first home Big East game back on January 2nd in the St. John’s Red Storm. Chris Mullin’s squad has struggled this season, but the Friars can ill afford a loss to the Red Storm since Providence played themselves back into the bubble discussion with a lousy February.

St. John’s got their lone league win of the season against DePaul on February 17th, but the common narrative heading into this game by some in the media, as well as Ed Cooley, is that the Red Storm have played better when they’ve played at MSG. That’s a nice sentiment to repeat, but the numbers don’t really bear that out, not to mention that a 5 game sample size is pretty small. In their 5 games at MSG this season, St. John’s is 2-3.

They did beat Syracuse behind some hot shooting, but their other win is a game they had to squeak out against St. Francis (NY), 63-56. Their 3 losses were a 20-point blowout by Georgetown, a comfortable 15-point win by Villanova and a 1 point loss against Seton Hall in a game that had one of the ugliest endings you’ll ever see. For my money, my narrative on St. John’s performance at MSG is that sometimes the other team plays down to St. John’s level and allows the game to be close. Here are some stats that might shed some light on this false narrative that St. John’s plays better at Madison Square Garden:

St. John’s season averages away from MSG:

• PPG: 66.8
• FG%: 39.5%
• 3FG%: 31.2%
• FT%: 63.2%
• TO’s: 14.9

St. John’s averages in 5 games at MSG this season:

• PPG: 66.8
• FG%: 41.5%
• 3FG%: 34.9%
• FT%: 64.5%
• TO’s: 17.2

The spike in 3-point shooting % is from their explosion of 12/25 against Syracuse, aka 1 game deviation from their norm. In fact, without that 48% 3-point shooting performance, the number at MSG is 31.7%. </End Rant>

The probable starters according to the game notes and prior box scores are:

Providence

• Kyron Cartwright – #24 – Sophomore
• Kris Dunn – #3 – Junior
• Junior Lomomba – #32 – Junior
• Rodney Bullock – #5 – Sophomore
• Ben Bentil – #0 – Sophomore

St. John’s

• Malik Ellison  – #0 – Freshman
• Durand Johnson – #5 – Graduate Student
• Ron Mvouika – #24 – Graduate Student
• Kassoum Yakwe – #14 – Freshman
• Yankuba Sima – #35 – Freshman

The key to victory is be focused and prepared as if this opponent is 16-1 in the league. Providence is better than St. John’s. This is a rare team where the Friars have guys on their bench that are better than some of the other team’s starters. In their first meeting this season, Providence shot the ball well from the field, got 20 points off turnovers and won the rebounding battle by 9 boards. As long as Providence doesn’t come out flat and let St. John’s get any semblance of confidence, the Friars should cruise to an easy victory. I think they win and cover and head into the Big East Tournament next week as the 4 seed.

Prediction: Providence 78 St. John’s 66

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Mike Hopkins

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