St. John’s men’s basketball wrangles Texas in encouraging exhibition finale

Although St. John’s survived last week’s four-overtime gauntlet against Rutgers with a win, they were unsatisfied with their performance and knew they needed to take massive strides to contend with seventh-ranked Texas in their final tune-up. They not only met the challenge, but also overdelivered.

The Red Storm ended their preseason on a high note with an 87-74 wire-to-wire win over the Longhorns on Sunday afternoon, proving they can outmatch the country’s best when their game clicks.

Advertisement

“I felt that we had to make a quantum leap from the Rutgers game,” Rick Pitino said on Sunday, “I was on them constantly on certain things, and they made a quantum leap today.”

St. John’s set the tone with active defense, turning ten Texas first-half turnovers into 14 points and holding the Longhorns to just 42.3% shooting before halftime. The Red Storm took the lead on a Tounde Yessoufou steal and breakaway layup at the 19:07 mark in the first half, and they held onto it for the remainder of the contest.

Yessoufou, along with Ian Jackson and Keyshawn Hall, overwhelmed the Longhorns all day long. The offensively gifted trio showed off their firepower, scoring 65 of the Red Storm’s 87 total points and shooting 23-of-41 from the field (56 percent), and they shut down a Texas rally going into halftime by combining for a 12-0 run to send St. John’s into the break with a 49-31 lead. That margin ballooned to 22 points early in the second half.

Advertisement

“Every game is important to us; we want to show we can be connected, and today our play showed for itself,” Tounde Yessoufou told the media after the game.

The Baylor transfer showcased his two-way skill set with 23 points (8-of-14), five assists, and five steals, attacking the basket with authority and flexing his range with two made triples.

Ian Jackson put behind shoddy outings in the Red Storm’s previous two scrimmages and played with all sorts of control on Sunday, scoring 18 points (7-of-14), leading the Johnnies with three made…

Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/st-john-men-basketball-wrangles-044014518.html

Author :

Publish date : 2026-10-26 04:40:00

Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source.