Sophomore guard Nurideen Lindsay paced a balanced attack in what was the team's best effort of the season as they scored a convincing 82-59 win over Maryland Baltimore County at Carnesecca Arena yesterday.
"I think there was a breakthrough in terms of our sustained effort and intensity," coach Steve Lavin said. "That was a mature point for this time of the season".
That effort gave St. John's its first halftime lead of the season and while the margin (39-34) was modest there was a concerted effort on the part of Lavin's young charges to avoid the early struggles of the first two games.
"We were all trying to go in the same direction early. That's something we talked about the last couple of days, " said Lindsay. It was his effort that got St. John's kick started. He penetrated well both in transition and in their half court offense, found his teammates, especially forwards God'sgift Achiuwa and Moe Harkless for easy hoops and did an exceptional job rebounding. Ten of his 15 points 7 of his 10 rebounds and 5 of his 9 assists came in the opening 20 minutes. A nice in and out move by Phil Greene gave him space to connect on a tough jumper as the halftime buzzer sounded, and then a small adjustment by the coaching staff helped the youngsters take that advantage and run with it, so to speak.
"We inverted the game a bit," was the way Steve Lavin described a move where they allowed Lindsey and Greene to push the ball up while nominal starting point guard Malik Stith got out on the break and got opportunities to finish plays. The result was a 9-1 run to open the second half and bump the lead to 13 points. St. John's approach after that was one that Lavin happily described as "methodical" as they pushed the lead past 30 and got all 5 starters into double figures scoring. While Lavin admitted that there are still things to "clean up from an execution standpoint" the sustained effort and execution was a welcome site as they take a step up in the level of competition Thursday against Arizona at Madison Square Garden.
In addition to Lindsey's near triple double effort Achiuwa had 15 points and 8 boards. Harkless added a game high 18 points, freshman D'angelo Harrison added 17 while Stith added 11. For UMBC a pair of local players, Brian Neller of Christian Brothers (NJ) Academy and Chase Plummer of St. Patrick's (NJ) led the scoring with 13 and 12 points respectfully. Former All Hallows guard senior Chris De La Rosa, who is the America East Confrence's leading returning player missed the game and has yet to play this season following off season foot surgery. A pair of talented local forwards who are perspective recruits for St. John's Chris Obekpa a senior at Our Savior New American (LI) and Mike Young a junior at Hudson Catholic in New Jersey both visited the campus and attended the game yesterday.
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