Ponds Leads St. John's Past Fordham For 3rd Straight Win

              For some St. John's fans, the Red Storm took a step towards restoring order in New York City college hoops.

              Last night's 90-62 win over Bronx rival Fordham was easily the Johnnies best effort of the season. And in the eyes of those who think St. John's needs to re-establish college hoops supremacy in the city it avenged last season's loss at Rose Hill.

             Just as he did in a much tighter game Monday against CSUN Shamorie Ponds took control of the offense early and led St. John's to the win.  Thursday's performance was even better than Monday's for both Ponds and the team as a whole. The freshman guard from Thomas Jefferson High finished with 26 points on 7-11 shooting from distance and 9-13 overall. He did his usual  yeoman's job on the boards hauling in 7 caroms and added 9 assists and 4 steals.

              "It's not possible without my teammates", Ponds said of his performance, "they have really made the transition (to college basketball) easier for me."

              Also just as he did Monday Ponds came up huge in the absence of his backcourt partner Marcus LoVett, who missed his second straight game with a sprained ankle. While Ponds continued to establish himself as a leader in LoVett's absence. Federico Mussini came off the bench to score 20 points on 7-9 shooting. His driving basket and foul as the first half buzzer sounded capped an 8-0 run and helped St. John's regain their footing after Fordham had cut a double digit deficit to one on a basket by Taveras. After the two teams traded baskets to begin the second half an 11-2 run for the Johnnies effectively salted the game away. That rally included a three-pointer plus one from Ponds. Overall the Johnnies converted on 58% of their shots and 48%  from three point distance. Bashir Ahmed (11 points) and Tariq Owens (10) were the other double figure scorers.

              Both Owens and Malik Ellison made terrific contributions to St. John's defensive effort. Owens had 4 of his team's 10 blocks but more significantly did the best job of any Johnnies big man defending Chris Sengfelder, contesting his outside shots on pick and pop or trail three action. Sengfelder did finish with 20 points but much of that came when Owens was either off the floor or tending to more traditional defensive responsibilities at the rim. Similarly Ellison's primary contribution came guarding Fordham's best player Joseph Chartouny.  Injury related rust likely contributed to Chartounny's struggles but Ellison's length and due diligence helped limit him  to an 0-7 shooting night.