{"id":180227,"date":"2021-02-17T08:37:40","date_gmt":"2021-02-17T05:37:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/st-johns-depth-keying-ncaa-tournament-push\/"},"modified":"2021-02-17T08:37:40","modified_gmt":"2021-02-17T05:37:40","slug":"st-johns-depth-keying-ncaa-tournament-push","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/st-johns-depth-keying-ncaa-tournament-push\/","title":{"rendered":"#St. John’s depth keying NCAA Tournament push"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#St. John’s depth keying NCAA Tournament push<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

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The stars played like stars, and you need that at this time of the year. You need your winning players to make winning plays in must-win game<\/a>s, and they did that. Julian Champagnie was terrific: 21 points, five rebounds. Rasheem Dunn was excellent: 17 points, and four dimes.<\/p>\n

Posh Alexander? He was everywhere, of course, nine assists and three steals and 15 points, sometimes looking like he could guard each member of the Xavier Musketeers by himself, all at the same time. The big guys were big, and St. John\u2019s won a got-to-have-it game on Carnesecca Court 93-84, their 14th win in 22 games, their eighth in 15 Big East games, their seventh in eight tries.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019ve got to hold service,\u201d coach Mike Anderson said after his 400th career win, after the Johnnies paid the Musketeers back for a 69-61 loss in Cincinnati on Jan. 6. \u201cThis is the time of year. It was an exciting game, up and down, it was fun, a lot of shot-making.\u201d<\/p>\n

What separates St. John\u2019s from most of the muddled members of the Big East\u2019s middle class, and from the other residents on either side of the NCAA Tournament bubble, is how deep they are, and not just in a token way. Anderson played nine guys Wednesday and all nine were essential to the cause.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s like Coach says: we have eight starters,\u201d said Marcellus Earlington, one of those bench players who ruined Xavier in this one. \u201cEveryone goes in and plays hard, plays their minutes.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\"Julian
Julian Champagnie<\/figcaption>
Robert Sabo<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

That isn\u2019t always easy in the college game. Kids don\u2019t get big minutes right away, there is always the transfer portal. There are always other campuses, other coaches looking for help in a hurry. Rare is the team that can keep that many players happ<\/a>y.<\/p>\n

Of course, the way Anderson\u2019s teams play, guys are happy to take a shift on the bench every now and again in order to catch their breath, and not to pass out. And guys such as Earlington (16 points, nine rebounds in 21 minutes) and Isaih Moore (11 points, five rebounds, 19 minutes) are more than happy to step into the breach.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe know how good we can be,\u201d Earlington said. \u201cWe go out there listen to the coaches and play hard. We take our practices into the game. We enjoy playing with each other, we play, we listen to the coaches.\u201d<\/p>\n

In many ways, Earlington represents the very best of what St. John\u2019s is now. From the moment Anderson was hired the worry has been: Can he recruit New York? Can he recruit nationally to make up for his lack of history in New York? Fretting about recruiting is a full-time job for most fans of college ball.<\/p>\n

And yet Earlington was here when Anderson showed up, recruited by Chris Mullin out of Don Bosco Prep in North Jersey, a football power at which Earlington excelled in the school specialty. He could have gone just about anywhere to play big-time football. That seemed to be his college calling card.<\/p>\n

But the kid loved basketball, not football. Mullin gave him the opportunity, but it was the arrival of Anderson and his two-platoon system that allowed Earlingon\u2019s game the proper vessel for what he does well. He may not look like a classic perimeter player, and he\u2019s not, but he sure knocked down his first four 3-pointers Wednesday. He was one more hole Xavier needed to plug. And couldn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ll do whatever it takes to get the win,\u201d Earlington said, and that is a team-wide mantra, and it has allowed the Johnnies to turn a 1-5 start in the Big East into where they are now, needing just to hold serve against DePaul and Providence and steal one against either Seton Hall or Villanova to likely solidify a place in the Indianapolis Invitational in a few weeks.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a four-game season,\u201d Anderson said, all business as usual, an earnestness that pulses throughout his team.<\/p>\n

The big guys, they\u2019ll be ready for those games. And so will everyone else. At St. John\u2019s, in this fine, fun season, that much is certain.\n <\/p><\/div>\n

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Source<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“#St. John’s depth keying NCAA Tournament push” The stars played like stars, and you need that at this time of the year. You need your winning players to make winning plays in must-win games, and they did that. Julian Champagnie was terrific: 21 points, five rebounds. Rasheem Dunn was excellent: 17 points, and four dimes….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":180228,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/nypost.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/02\/stjohnsdunn.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&w=1200","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[70897],"tags":[93713,72026,72027],"class_list":["post-180227","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-2-17-21","tag-college-basketball","tag-st-johns-red-storm"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180227","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=180227"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180227\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/180228"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=180227"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=180227"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=180227"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}