HoopsHD’s Jon Teitel will spend the upcoming months covering several Georgetown basketball home games, with a very special reward coming in March. You can find Parts 1-5 at:
https://hoopshd.com/2019/11/09/still-hanging-with-the-hoyas-part-1
https://hoopshd.com/2019/11/20/still-hanging-with-the-hoyas-part-2
https://hoopshd.com/2019/12/15/still-hanging-with-the-hoyas-part-3
https://hoopshd.com/2019/12/20/still-hanging-with-the-hoyas-part-4
https://hoopshd.com/2019/12/29/still-hanging-with-the-hoyas-part-5
He continues his series with Part 6 featuring the Hoyas’ matchup last night against St. John’s:
A new and improved pregame meal this time around: chicken parmigiana/ziti/salad and an apple pastry! I was delighted to see former Georgetown coach John Thompson on the sideline for the 1st time all season after overcoming some medical issues: stay well Coach!
Let’s huddle up and get it going:
The Red Storm played like the Red Death early on: 8 TO in the 1st 10 minutes allowed the Hoyas to open up a 25-9 lead, and it only got worse from there. St. John’s only made 2-14 threes in the 1st half while Hoyas SR G Jagan Mosely outshot the entire team by himself with a trio of trifectas, the last of which gave his team a ridiculous 45-16 scoreboard advantage after only 16 minutes of action:
His backcourt mate Mac McClung had 1 of the best 1st half performances of his career: a wintry blizzard of layups and threes gave him 16 PTS in 16 minutes to match his opponent’s scoring total, and he finished the opening stanza with a whopping 21 PTS as his team kept pouring it on to enter halftime with a 53-26 lead:
Georgetown coach Patrick Ewing had a rough week with road losses at Providence/Seton Hall by double-digits so he needed this 1 rather badly:
The only damper on an otherwise near-perfect 20 minutes was seeing SR C Omer Yurtseven get poked in the right eye just 6 minutes into the game, followed by the big man holding a towel to his face while walking to the locker room. Fortunately, he returned a few minutes later with a bandaged cut over his eye, then had the trainer clean some blood off his uniform, and he still scored 6 PTS in 12 minutes before heading back to the locker room with the rest of his squad:
My personal highlight was when the ball bounced out of bounds and I passed it back to the ref: no photo available!
St. John’s coach Mike Anderson must have given a great halftime speech because even though he benched 2 of his starters (Josh Roberts/Julian Champagnie) the rest of his guys came out swinging and went on an 11-0 run to start the 2nd half, causing Ewing to call a quick timeout and…discuss the situation with his players:
It was basically a 2-man show for the Red Storm in the 2nd half as LJ Figueroa/Rasheem Dunn combined for 25 PTS/7 REB/4 STL…but it was nowhere near enough:
The surprising 2nd half scoring star for the Hoyas was JR wing Jamorko Pickett: the only player on either team to play each of the final 20 minutes, he scored 10 of his 18 total PTS in the 2nd half on a REB/putback, a pair of layups, a long corner jump shot, and a pair of FTs:
Georgetown attempted 18 more FTs then St. John’s, had 10 more AST/7 more BLK, and dominated from start to finish in its 87-66 victory.
I did not have a chance to get a word in edgewise during Coach Anderson’s postgame press conference (thank you New York-based media members!) but got to ask Coach Ewing how his team was able to get out to a 53-26 halftime lead after being outscored by a combined 95-47(!) during the 1st half of their previous 2 conference games. He pondered his response, then smiled and said that it was due to “home cooking”. He mentioned that his team played 2 poor games on the road so he spent the past few days talking to them about not digging themselves into a deep hole. He was still concerned about his team’s 12 turnovers in the 2nd half tonight and believes that they still have to finish games if they want to win games:
That’s all for now, check back in the weeks ahead for Part 7.