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Preview: Longwood at St. John’s
St. John’s has scored increasingly fewer points – 75, 73, 67 and 64, respectively – in its first four games, but the Red Storm have an excellent chance to reverse that trend Tuesday night against visiting Longwood. The Lancers have surrendered at least 80 points in all five of their games this season and allowed Penn State to shoot 57.1 percent in Sunday’s 26-point loss. In addition to his team’s offensive slump, St. John’s coach Steve Lavin “was not pleased with our effort on the defensive end of the floor (against Monmouth on Friday). I felt that we were a step slow the entire night.”
The Red Storm won that game 64-54 thanks to 22 points from Phil Greene IV and 15 from D’Angelo Harrison. Harrison, the team’s leading scorer at 19.8 points per game, made a couple of big 3-pointers down the stretch but still is only shooting 5-of-24 from deep range. Longwood also has a legitimate scoring threat in Tristan Carey, who enters this game averaging 18.8 points – nearly twice the average of the Lancers’ next highest scorer.
ABOUT LONGWOOD (2-3): Coming off an 8-25 season, Longwood notched a surprising road win at Texas Christian on Nov. 12 as Carey scored 31 points and Lucas Woodhouse hit the game-winning 3 with 1.7 seconds left. Carey and Woodhouse scored 13 and eight points, respectively, against Penn State, but the Lancers’ reserves actually outscored their starters 34-33. Following the loss to the Nittany Lions, Longwood coach Jayson Gee said, “I was really proud of our guys. … Coming off that loss Friday night (against Brown) and to turn around in less than 48 hours and compete on a Big Ten floor was a positive thing.”
ABOUT ST. JOHN’S (3-1): Entering Monday’s action, the Red Storm were 262nd in the nation in points per game (69.8). JaKarr Sampson (14.8) and Greene (12.0) join Harrison in double-figure scoring, while Sampson leads the team with 7.3 rebounds per game. St. John’s is averaging just 10 turnovers, with no player on the team turning it over more than 1.7 times per contest.
TIP-INS
1. The Red Storm bench managed only six points on 2-of-12 shooting against Monmouth.
2. St. John’s matched a school record with 15 blocks their last time out.
3. The Lancers rank 345th out of 351 Division I schools in rebounding at 29.2 boards per game.
PREDICTION: St. John’s 77, Longwood 61
