St. John’s final: Bulldogs blitz Red Storm 70-45

St. John’s aimed to turn around their dull season on the road against Butler. The misery continued as the Bulldogs wiped the Red Storm by a 70-45 score.

From the opening tip, Butler controlled this contest. Just about 8 minutes into the game, Butler held a 21-7 lead. Headed into the halftime break, the Bulldogs held a 37-15 advantage. From there, they would never look back.

Many of the issues plaguing St. John’s today are reoccurring. Once again, the Red Storm did a really poor job defending the three-point line. Butler was hitting from all over the floor, finishing 12-30 from deep. Kelan Martin led the way from downtown, hitting 4 three-pointers. Even if Butler was not making the three’s, they were still getting excellent looks. This is an area St. John’s must improve upon if they are to win any contests in the conference.

Additionally, the Red Storm’s offense looked lifeless throughout. St. John’s struggled mightily to find and hit good shots. They shot 29% from the field and 24% from deep. Furthermore, they turned the ball over at a disconcerting rate. They finished with 11 turnovers. Shamorie Ponds poor play did not help these efforts either. Ponds had 2 points while shooting 0-12 from the floor.

Another area of concern was the rebounding effort. Butler collected too many rebounds. As a team, they snatched 42 and had 8 on the offensive end. Butler’s Tyler Wideman led the way with 11 himself.

One bright spot for St. John’s was the play of Tariq Owens. Without Kassoum Yakwe, Owens did his best leading the frontcourt. He finished with 13 points and 9 rebounds.

St. John’s returns to action on Tuesday night against the Xavier Musketeers. That contest will take place at Carnesecca Arena, and will be televised on CBS Sports Network. The Johnnies have a number of things to clean up before challenging the Musketeers.