St. John’s Red Storm
2020-2021 Overall Rank: #62
Conference Rank: #8 Big East
It clearly took some time for Coach Mike Anderson to get St. John’s to play his style of basketball. And it will take more time before his players fill the system. Yet, the Red Storm started playing pretty well late last season. The team won three of their last four games, including a momentum building 91-71 victory over Creighton. St. John’s also beat Marquette and Georgetown to finish up the season. That is some decent momentum for the program heading into 2020-2021, but they will have to move into this season without star guards LJ Figueroa and Mustapha Heron.
2019-20 Record: 17-15, 5-13
Coach: Mike Anderson
Coach Record: 17-15 at St. John’s, 386-215 overall
Key Departed Players:
LJ Figueroa, Guard/Forward, 14.5 ppg
Mustapha Heron, Guard, 13.8 ppg
Nick Rutherford, Guard, 5.5 ppg
Damiem Sears, Forward, 1.3 ppg
Key Returning Players:
Julian Champagnie, Sophomore, Guard/Forward, 9.9 ppg
Josh Roberts, Junior, Forward, 5.0 ppg
Rasheem Dunn, Senior, Guard, 11.9 ppg
Marcellus Earlington, Junior, Forward, 9.0 ppg
Greg Williams Jr, Junior, Guard, 5.7 ppg
David Caraher, Junior, Guard/Forward, 4.3 ppg
Key New Players:
Dylan Addae-West, Freshman, Guard
Posh Alexander, Freshman, Guard
Vince Cole, Junior, Guard/Forward, JC Transfer
John McGriff, RS Freshman, Guard
Isaih Moore, Junior, Forward, JC Transfer
Amaldo Toro, Senior, Forward, Grad Transfer from George Washington
Projection:
Coach Anderson returns six players from his regular rotation. Julian Champagnie, a 6-8 wing, had a superb freshman campaign, tallying 9.9 points and a team high 6.5 rebounds. If he can start knocking down his long balls with a little more consistency, Champagnie will be competing for All-Big East accolades. Josh Roberts and Marcellus Earlington are also back and ranked second and third on the team in rebounding. St. John’s was a poor rebounding team last season, but at least they have some proven rebounders back. Earlington is also a decent all-around scorer who can attack the basket effectively. But most of the scoring will come from Rasheem Dunn. The 6-2 senior tallied 11.9 points and 3.4 assists last season and is now ready to take over the leadership of this team. Greg Williams and David Caraher will add some experienced options on the perimeter. The perimeter will also get a boost from All-American junior college transfer Vince Cole. The newcomers also include Amaldo Toro, a graduate transfer from George Washington, and junior college transfer Isaih Moore. Those two will help out in the rebounding department significantly. That should provide Coach Anderson enough depth to keep the pressure on defensively and that could cause some trouble for the rest of the Big East.
Projected Postseason Tournament: NIT
By the Numbers:
Scoring Offense: 74.6 (86th in nation, 5th in conference)
Scoring Defense: 71.6 (238, 8)
Field-Goal Percentage: 40.9 (313, 10)
Field-Goal Defense: 41.5 (92, 6)
Three-Point Field Goals Per Game: 6.6 (234, 7)
Three-Point Field-Goal Percentage: 32.1 (245, 8)
Free-Throw Percentage: 70.3 (197, 7)
Rebound Margin: -2.6 (290, 10)
Assists Per Game: 14.7 (51, 3)
Turnovers Per Game: 11.2 (30, 3)
