No. 15 St. John's beats Georgetown for 7th straight win

WASHINGTON (AP) — Kadary Richmond and Zuby Ejiofor had 13 points apiece as No. 15 St. John's rolled to a 66-41 victory at Georgetown on Tuesday night, extending its winning streak to seven games.

Eight players scored for the Red Storm, on their longest run of consecutive wins in Big East play since 2000. First-place St. John's (18-3, 9-1) is off to its best start since opening the 1985-86 season 20-2 during the program's heyday under Hall of Fame coach Lou Carnesecca.

This one was over early, with Rick Pitino's team jumping ahead by scores of 23-3 and 37-9 and leading by 30 late in the first half. Malik Mack had 13 points for Georgetown (13-8, 4-6), which cut the margin to 15 with 6:33 remaining but could not close the gap any further.

As a result, the party continues for St. John's, which has its highest ranking in the AP Top 25 poll since the week of Dec. 29, 2014. The Red Storm jumped five spots after rallying to beat Xavier in overtime last week.

Takeaways

St. John’s: This team is good enough to come back from down 16 in the second half, as it did against Xavier, or hang on after building a big lead. The path to a first NCAA Tournament appearance since 2019 is clear in Pitino’s second season in charge in Queens.

Georgetown: Scoring continues to be an issue for coach Ed Cooley's bunch. The Hoyas failed to reach 70 points for an eighth consecutive game, the program's longest such stretch since 2005-06, and 41 was their lowest total of the season.

Key moment

After Georgetown got within 15, Aaron Scott ended a scoring drought of over four minutes for St. John's by making a 3-pointer with 5:04 remaining.

Key stat

St. John's has won the teams' last nine meetings dating to Georgetown's 97-94 OT victory on Dec. 13, 2020.

Up next

St. John’s: Will host Providence at Madison Square Garden on Saturday.

Georgetown: Hosts Butler on Friday night.

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