St. John’s? Again?
Yes, you read that right. One week after outlasting the Red Storm in a thrilling OT victory, Georgetown will travel to New York City and Carnesecca Arena to take on St. John’s once again.
Since the two teams met last Sunday, the Johnnies dropped their third consecutive Big East game, losing to #9 Creighton 94-76. “I am not going to say anyone has the advantage,” said Coach Ewing in anticipation of Sunday’s matchup, which tips at 6:30 PM. “We both made mistakes. I’m sure both both teams are going to try to do the best they can to limit the mistakes, or change the things they did wrong.”
The biggest storyline entering the game will be the absence of veteran guard Jalen Harris. On Friday, Ewing told the media that Harris is taking a leave of absence from the team for family reasons and will miss Sunday’s game at a minimum. Harris started each of Georgetown’s first five games before missing last week’s contest with back spasms, and he leads the Hoyas in assists. Taking his place will be freshman guard Dante Harris, who impressed in the win over St. John’s, pouring in 22 points in 43 minutes of action. Harris was even named Big East Freshman of the Week for his efforts.
Perhaps most concerning is the Hoyas’ lack of depth at the guard position with the elder Harris unavailable. Dante will likely be forced to play close to the entire game once again, with senior guard Jahvon Blair being the only other real option to run point (though that is clearly not his forte either). As good as Dante Harris was last Sunday, he did look visibly gassed towards the end of the game. The stats tell a similar story, with Harris shooting just 2 of 8 from the field in the second half and overtime. This will be something to keep an eye on both tonight and moving forward if he is to be an everyday starter as we expect.
With Dante Harris moving into a starting role, fellow freshman TJ Berger is the only remaining scholarship guard coming off the bench. Ewing would not commit to playing Berger more, saying “He will play, but not sure how much.” But with few other options to turn to, I’m willing to bet Berger sees significant playing time tonight (probably around ten minutes, give or take).
As always, minimizing turnovers will be key to Georgetown’s success. Last time out against the Johnnies, the Hoyas turned it over 16 times, slightly below their season average of 17.2 but still not close to where Ewing would like his team to be. When asked what was a point of emphasis in practice this week, senior Jamorko Pickett predictably identified turnovers. “I don’t know how many we’re averaging,” said Pickett, “but I know it’s way too many.” Let’s hope that a week of practice has paid off, as St. John’s can put up points in a hurry if they can turn their opponents over and get out in transition.
When the two teams last met a week ago, the Hoyas were surprisingly outrebounded by a significant margin (45-34) and allowed the Red Storm to collect 20 offensive rebounds. Coach Ewing surely couldn’t have been pleased with that result against a relatively undersized St. John’s team. “Really, I put that blame on myself,” Pickett responded when asked about the Johnnies dominating the rebounding battle. “Them having 20 rebounds on the offensive glass definitely won’t happen again.” Personally, I love to see Pickett both taking responsibility for the team’s shortcomings and exuding confidence that it won’t be a perpetual issue.
Another storyline to watch will be the play of St. John’s star Julian Champagnie. Over the course of the Johnnies’ first five games this season, Champagnie averaged a scorching 22.4 points per game on 49% shooting from the floor. Since then, he has cooled off quite a bit, making just 8 of 24 field goal attempts and 3 of 14 three-point attempts in back-to-back losses to Georgetown and Creighton. If St. John’s hopes to escape the basement of the Big East, Champagnie will have to regain his early season form. For the Hoyas, keeping Champagnie under wraps once again and limiting his impact on the game is of critical importance.
If the history of this rivalry has taught us anything, it’s that seemingly every Georgetown-St. John’s game will be full of excitement, and likely quite a bit of chaos. Buckle up.
Jacob’s Prediction (6-0 on the season): St. John’s 79, Georgetown 77
This is the first game this season where I could go either way with my pick; it truly is a 50-50 game. Both teams seem equally capable of playing well and making boneheaded mistakes, so much so that it took overtime to decide a winner last Sunday. I’ll roll with the Johnnies here simply because I think the Hoyas’ turnover issues will catch up to them. And Qudus Wahab isn’t going to block nine shots every game (though I wish he would).
Will’s Prediction (5-1 on the season): St. John’s 83, Georgetown 79
I tweeted this last week, and it turned out to be surprisingly prescient just 30 seconds later.
I’m all but certain the Hoyas aren’t going to repeat their performance last time out. Qudus probably won’t be a one-man block party (but God I’d love it if he did it again), and we probably don’t get outrebounded by St. John’s by such a large margin. For their part, the Red Storm seem to have some serious chemistry issues right now. Tonight’s game is going to be a lot different than the last game as both teams are going to focus on cleaning up the parts they were sloppy at last time. What pushes me towards the Red Storm winning though is (to borrow a line from Bobby over at the Bet the Blue and Gray column), “There is no way the Hoyas replicate 48% from three and 56% from the floor.”
That being said, I’ll still be tuning in (that was never in doubt). The games may be sloppy, but hell, if they’re aren’t a blast to watch. I’m ready for some more OT action.
