St. John’s left Carnesecca Arena two weeks ago with quickly rising confidence, showcasing far more talent and readiness than last season, along with greater potential than seemed possible before the season started.
But Tuesday night, the Red Storm return to Queens looking little like the team that crafted back-to-back blowout wins to start the season, facing Delaware State after suffering four straight losses.
After failing its first true test of the season in a loss at Minnesota, St. John’s (2-4) swung and missed on three more opportunities during the Battle 4 Atlantis in the Bahamas, falling in the final minutes against Michigan State, VCU and Old Dominion.
“It was tough competition, and what we learned was we’ve got to keep playing hard,” forward Bashir Ahmed said. “I feel like sometimes it was effort. … We started off good, and then it seemed like the second half we made mistakes that we have to clean up as a team. Most of us on the team are new. It’s six games into the season, so there’s still a lot we need to learn.”
Coach Chris Mullin was most bothered by how consistently the team’s play has dropped as games progress, having blown leads in each of the losses.
Last season, there was only so much the undermanned team could do, facing an insuperable talent gap in most games. This season, execution is the biggest obstacle.
“We probably took a step back,” Mullin said after Friday’s loss to Old Dominion. “To develop team chemistry and trust, it takes going through this stuff, flushing it out and working through it. As frustrating as it is, that’s usually what makes a team, if you can get through it together. No one likes to lose and play terrible, but usually when you look back, that is what turns a team into a team.”
Cohesion wasn’t much of an issue in the Red Storm’s first two games, in which they averaged more than 88 points while shooting 52.6 percent from the field and 40.7 percent on 3-pointers, but that offense was unrecognizable in the Bahamas, where they averaged 62 points, while hitting 35 percent from the field and less than 30 percent on 3-pointers.
After a weekend against longer and more athletic defenders, St. John’s hopes to find more offensive balance against the Hornets (1-5) — entering on a five-game losing streak after defeating Division III Summit — with Ahmed, Marcus LoVett and Shamorie Ponds the only players averaging more than eight points per game.
“We have to build that chemistry, trust one another on the team, move the ball around more,” Ahmed said. “Everybody is still learning and finding their role on the team. … At this point in the season, we just want to stay hungry and move forward. We lose games. All we can do is learn from them.”