St. John’s Matchup with Arizona About Experience and Awareness

QUEENS, NEW YORK- St. John’s head coach Steve Lavin brought his players into the film room this week, as he always does, in preparation for their Thursday night game against Arizona at Madison Square Garden.

But with six first-year players on his roster, he tried to create the atmosphere that they would encounter when they step on the floor in Manhattan, with the lights of national television shining on them.

“We showed some Connecticut, some Pittsburgh, maybe even some Duke [game film from a season ago], and let it run for some time with the volume up so our players could get a little sense of what makes Madison Square Garden unique,” Lavin explained. “But, at the end of it, they’re going to have to go through…the experience of having that natural adrenaline and all the vital signs headed north.”

Lavin’s 3-0 Red Storm will face head coach Sean Miller’s Arizona Wildcats, who also stand at 3-0, after coming from behind to beat Ball State, 73-63, on Sunday.

Junior guard Malik Stith, as the only returning letterwinner on this young Red Storm roster, is the only player who can speak from experience about playing at the Garden.

“It feels good, I guess, just getting back to the big arena,” he said, not seeming to meditate on the past. “This will be our first test; first chance for us to play on national television; first time for the freshmen to get a feel of college basketball.”

The Red Storm ran into trouble in the first two games of their season, needing second-half rallies against William & Mary and Lehigh to win. But a convincing 82-59 win over UMBC on Sunday has turned the tide.

“I think it’s more of coming out with better intensity on defense in the first half,” said freshman forward Moe Harkless. “The first two games we really didn’t come out too strong and we, unfortunately, had to fight back to win and we can’t do that all season.”

And the problem of slow starts has not only been a Red Storm problem. It that has plagued the relatively-young Wildcats, as well.

After losing star forward Derrick Williams to the NBA Draft and point guard Momo Jones to transfer, Arizona relies on three freshman for production off the bench: guards Nick Johnson and Josiah Turner and forward Angelo Chol.

And the two sets of freshman are not unfamiliar.

Harkless says he has been acquainted with Arizona’s young players through the AAU circuit, along with being friendly with junior forward Kevin Parrom, who is a New York City native.

St. John’s freshman forward Sir’Dominic Pointer played with Turner at Quality Education Academy in North Carolina, during his senior season.

But despite all of the more obvious overtones, there is a more serious subtext to this game, as head coach Steve Lavin, returning from successful prostate cancer surgery, will make his first Madison Square Garden appearance of the season, this coming in the 2K Sports Classic, which benefits Coaches vs. Cancer.

“This event gives coaches an opportunity to put basketball in its proper light, in terms of prioritizing, yet it’s a delicate balance, because we have to get ready to play Arizona,” said Lavin.

Since his arrival as the head coach at St. John’s, Lavin has raised over $1 million for cancer research and has worked extensively with the V Foundation, for the same cause, in his time at UCLA and as a broadcaster at ESPN.

Raising money for research has become a focal point for Lavin, whose grandmother passed away from pancreatic cancer. His father is a survivor of prostate cancer, and both his mother and father have had bouts with skin cancer.

“Because I’ve had family members who have been inflicted, or ultimately victims of cancer, it has affected me in a profound way in terms of, from a young age, understanding the importance of fighting a good fight against cancer,” Lavin said.

And that positivity has rubbed off on his team.

“As you can see, it just brought out a new energy in us,” said Stith, the junior guard. “When he came out [in his return against Lehigh], the crowd went crazy. It just brought out a new life, having Coach Lav back.”

The Red Storm tip off against Arizona at 9:30pm.

“It’s our first test to see where we stand and what we have to work on and how far we’ve come,” Stith added. “We’ll see Thursday night.”