While his return to the sidelines may not have gone smoothly for St. John's coach Steve Lavin, the night ended perfectly, with a 78-73 win thanks in large part to a perfect shooting night from center God'sgift Achiuwa.
Lavin said he had made the decision to return to the bench at 3:30 following a return to practice on Monday. He walked on the court moments after his players had begun warm ups and was greeted with a warm and loud ovation by a home crowd that hadn't quite filled up yet.
When the game began he got an early glimpse of some of what his team had struggled with even as they began the season 2-0. They shot poorly, hurting themselves with quick shots and did not rotate or rebound well in their zone defense.
Behind their post player point guard combination of juniors C.J. McCollum and Gabe Knutson Lehigh moved ahead quickly. Dr. Brett Reed's team took and made good shots throughout the first half. And with Knutson providing a safe sure handed target in the middle of their press break offense they attacked St. John's pressure for scores effectively. A pair of free throws by McCollum with 5:30 minutes remaining in the first half gave Lehigh its largest margin of 16. St. John's then rallied and cut the lead to 7 but when Lehigh's Holden Griener found Jordan Hamilton for a trailer 3-pointer the Mountain Hawks led by ten 43-33 at the break.
St. John's did not fare much better in the opening minutes of the second half. Knutson followed in a Mackey McKnight miss to move Lehigh's lead back to 13 with just over 15 minutes left. Lehigh held that margin until foul trouble forced Knutson from the game and that, combined with a terrific effort from Coach Lavin's young team brought St. John's back.
Knutson picked up his third personal foul with just 14 minutes left and while St. John's did not put a big dent in the deficit immediately Lehigh's offense clearly struggled to move the ball without their big, sure handed, smart passing target in the middle.
St. John's had cut the lead to just 7 on two free throws by Achiuwa. When Knutson was subbed back in a moment later it appeared that he had restored order for Lehigh. Trailing by 7, the Mountain Hawks moved the ball and got McCollum an open look for a three pointer. Knutson then stole the ball and that led to a Griener layup again.
St. John's trailed by a 60-48 margin with 8:38 when Achiuwa, who shot 6-6 from the field and 9-9 from the charity stripe made the biggest play of his perfect shooting night, driving to the bucket for a basket and drawing Knutson's fourth personal foul. By the time Knutson re-entered the game with 6:31 left the Red Storm had trimmed the deficit to 4, and had reversed the momentum Lehigh had had in its favor throughout the game A Moe Harkless three pointer tied the game at 64 and after the Mountain Hawks regained the lead briefly took the lead for good 67-66 on a steal and basket by Sir^Dominic Pointer, whose hustle and quickness at the top of their zone pressure has made pressure defense their most effective weapon in this early season.
"The good news is they demonstrated resiliency and determination to come back after being down more than double digits," Lavin said. While those two attributes have carried the team through some rough patches early, tonight's effort likely got an extra boost from their coach, who showed a resiliency and determination of his own as he deals with circumstances infinitely more significant than a ballgame.
Achiuwa led St. John's with 21 points and 8 rebounds while Harkless and Nurideen Lindsey added 15 points apiece. McCollum led Lehigh with 19 points while Knutson added 16. Local product Conroy Baltimore, a freshman from Stepinac High did not score in 6 minutes of action off the bench St. John's takes on Maryland Baltimore County at 2pm on Sunday before resuming the 2k Coaches vs. Cancer tournament a week from today, November 17th vs.. Arizona at Madison Square Garden.
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