Making History
Last night’s win marked Coach Anderson’s 400th career win as an NCAAM head coach. It also clinched yet another winning season for him, making it nineteen seasons straight. He is just one of four D-1 coaches with 15+ years of experience who can say this. Let’s take a look back at what was happening during Coach Anderson’s first career season as a head coach in 2002:
- The first Spider-Man was released in theaters.
- Eminem’s The Eminem Show was the biggest selling album of the year.
- Apple released its second generation iPod.
- Kelly Clarkson won the very first season of American Idol.
Nearly two decades of winning basketball at multiple high major programs is incredible. Congratulations again to Coach Anderson on making history.
Player of the Game
At this point it’s almost an automatic to choose Posh or Julian as player of the game on any given night. They could have been co-players of the game last night again, but someone else stuck out to me as a massive X-factor in this one.
Marcellus Earlington was a massive spark off of the bench for us last night. He scored 16 points and pulled down 9 rebounds (team high), coming up clutch all night long. To me, this team has two X-factors. Marcellus Earlington and Vince Cole. While Cole struggled last night, Marcellus more than made up for it. If Cellus can string a few games like this together, we are going to be in great shape for a tournament push.
Dynamic Duo
You really can’t recap any game without dedicating an entire section of the article to our star freshman point guard, Posh Alexander. Last night Posh left it all on the floor (as he always does) and gave Xavier hell for forty minutes. In the midst of a huge victory it seemed like this got slept on last night:
I have no doubt that Posh will secure a triple-double at some point in his tenure at St. John’s. He did it all last night and not just offensively. To go along with his near triple-double performance, he also added three steals. He currently sits at seventh in that nation in that category.
It’s hard to talk about Posh without mentioning his partner in crime, Julian Champagnie. These two have developed unbreakable chemistry on the court and it is a special thing to watch. They connected for a pair of highlight alley oops last night that got everyone out of their seats.
Champagnie led the way in the scoring column last night. He tallied 21 points on a variety of shots and also went 7-7 from the free throw line. On the year, Julian is shooting 45% from the field, 42% from beyond the arc, and 87.5% from the free throw line. Outstanding numbers especially for someone who shoots at a high volume.
Game Highlights
Tournament Talk
Okay, so the tournament seems to be all anyone is worried about this time of year. The way I understand it is, for us to find ourselves in the bracket we have to finish out the rest of the season 3-1 at the minimum. The only loss being to Villanova. The three must win games are DePaul, Providence, and Seton Hall. Essentially, we control our own destiny. In my eyes, if we win those 3 games and win one in the Big East tournament there is no way they can keep us out of the bracket.
Box Score
| Starters | REB | AST | STL | BLK | TO | PTS |
| Roberts | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Champagnie | 5 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 21 |
| Cole | 4 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 3 |
| Alexander | 8 | 9 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 15 |
| Dunn | 3 | 4 | 1 | 0 | 5 | 17 |
| Bench | ||||||
| Moore | 5 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 11 |
| Earlington | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 16 |
| Wusu | 2 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 4 | 2 |
| Williams | 1 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 8 |
Bet the Trend
St. John’s improves to 6-0 ATS in the last 6 games played at Carnesecca. Shoutout to anyone who tailed this pick.
Hopefully St. John’s can keep up their winning ways with a huge game on Saturday vs. DePaul.
Barstool St. John's 