St. John's Preview
February 15, 2005 03:24 PM | General
February 15, 2005
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Even though St. John’s was in the midst of a disastrous 6-21 season, Coach John Beilein believes West Virginia’s 73-64 victory at Alumni Hall last year ranks as one of his team’s better performances of 2004.
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| West Virginia's J.D. Collins goes for a loose ball during last Saturday's game at Georgetown.
AP Photo/Nick Wass |
The coach says West Virginia is going to have to have a similar effort in order to knock off the Red Storm Wednesday night.
“They are a team that is not nearly as disjointed as that team was a year ago,” he said.
St. John’s (8-13, 2-9) comes into the West Virginia game having lost three straight to Connecticut, Pitt and Seton Hall all on the road. St. John’s owns league wins at home over Pitt and Rutgers. Most recently, St. John’s dropped a 57-55 decision at Seton Hall Saturday night.
Junior guard Daryll Hill contributed 19 points in the Seton Hall loss and averages a team-best 19.7 points per game. Hill was particularly effective the first time around against West Virginia in Morgantown, scoring 29 points in a 64-60 loss to the Mountaineers.
“He’s one guy that you can’t stop sometimes,” Beilein said. “We have to try and stay in front of him. We have to keep him off rhythm a little bit with what we’re trying to do and just do all we can to keep him from having command of the game.”
Beilein says it’s tough to defend high-scoring point guards like Hill because they’re not easy to double team.
“Big guys you can double a lot on the inside and take away what they’re doing,” Beilein said. “Little guys are hard to double on the outside. They scoot by you and then they’re playing five on three.”
Hill has taken 140 more shots than the next closest player on the team Lamont Hamilton, who averages 13.2 points and 7.9 rebounds per game. Hamilton scored 15 in the loss to West Virginia.
“They’re not a one-man show; Hamilton is pretty darn good, too, and the rest of the kids know what they’re doing,” Beilein said.
Eugene Lawrence and Dexter Gray both average a little more than six points per game for the Red Storm in supporting roles.
West Virginia (14-8, 4-7) is looking for its second conference road victory of the season at St. John’s, having also won at Providence back on Jan. 29. The Mountaineers dropped a tough 67-60 decision at Georgetown last Saturday afternoon after winning back to back league games against Pitt and Providence at home.
In the Georgetown game several players were suffering the effects of the flu and Beilein says his team’s overall health was still an issue yesterday in practice.
“I thought we would be fine but yesterday was not terrific with some guys,” he said. “They got tired but we’re better. Some of the kids were on medication and others were on over-the-counter things. We haven’t kicked all of it but I think we’re better. I hope by Wednesday we’ll be 100 percent.”
West Virginia had just one player reach double figures in Kevin Pittsnogle (10 points) against Georgetown. The Mountaineers’ top two scorers Tyrone Sally (12.4 ppg.) and Mike Gansey (10.7 ppg.) combined to score just 14 points against the Hoyas.
Gansey and Sally are the only two WVU players averaging double figures.
Tip off for Wednesday’s game is set for 7:30 pm. The contest will be televised by ESPN Regional (Dave Sims and Jim Spanarkel) and will air locally on Fox Sports Net Pittsburgh.
Briefly:
“It’s very hard to win; we have four wins overall, not in the league, but we need to win a couple more on the road if we’re going to have a really good season and get ourselves in god position for the Big East tournament,” Beilein said.
