5 Thoughts: Seton Hall continues upward climb with quality win in Queens

Al-Amir Dawes’ hot shooting rescued Seton Hall from double-digit deficit and helped Pirates defeat St. John’s. (Photo by Bob Dea/Daly Dose Of Hoops)

By Jason Guerette (@JPGuerette)

NEW YORK — It had been quite a long time since the Seton Hall Pirates played on St. John's campus in Jamaica, Queens with fans in attendance. During most of the Kevin Willard years, the Pirates had played at Madison Square Garden when facing the Red Storm on the road, with the lone exception of the 2020-21 season, when there were no fans allowed because of the pandemic.

And despite being in foul trouble for a decent part of the night in a hostile environment, the Pirates got critical contributions up and down their lineup, and used a monster second-half run to beat the Red Storm in its own building, 84-72, the Pirates’ seventh win in their last nine games after an 0-3 Big East start.

Here are the late night Thoughts from Carnesecca Arena:

1. Game of Runs

Seton Hall came out well in this game on both ends, forcing early turnovers and using them to fuel its own offense, which dominated in the paint, building a 15-10 lead in the first seven minutes.

Then Mike Anderson called timeout after Seton Hall got three straight baskets from point-blank range, and the Red Storm proceeded to rattle off a 19-3 run to go up 29-18. Seton Hall couldn't stay out of foul trouble in this stretch, and also found open looks difficult to come by. It was as if a switch was flipped.

But it was Seton Hall that flipped that switch right back. Buoyed by three straight threes and five total points by former St. John's commit Jaquan Sanders, the Pirates ripped off a 12-0 run in the blink of an eye to get themselves right back into it before the half ended. It gave them a shot in the arm going into the locker room. 

In the second half, a 15-4 St. John's run that sandwiched a trio of technical fouls and Andre Curbelo's ejection from the game for throwing his goggles threatened to put the game out of reach for Seton Hall, but the Pirates then responded again with an 18-4 outburst that put them ahead for good.

Basketball is a game of runs, and tonight was that maxim writ large. Seton Hall was able to respond not once, but twice, in front of a hostile crowd, and it won the Pirates this game in the end.

2. Surviving The Stripes

It's never a great thing when one of the Thoughts is (partially) dedicated to three men not playing in the game, but it was kind of a rough game on the eyes. Brian O'Connell, Tony Chiazza and Jeff Anderson combined to whistle 44 fouls in the game, resulting in 49 free throws combined for the two worst free throw-shooting teams in the conference.

It was really a problem for the Pirates, as they had a whopping four players with four fouls (KC Ndefo, Femi Odukale, Tyrese Samuel, and Tae Davis) at the under-12 timeout in the second half. The aforementioned 15-4 St. John's second-half run was fueled by Pirate fouls (seven of them in just about a three-minute span), forcing Seton Hall to the edge with no margin for error.

And the pretty astounding thing is that the Pirates did just that. With Samuel and Davis on the floor playing with the four personals each, and Ndefo and Odukale on the bench, Seton Hall was able to turn the game around. Davis is one of the youngest players on the team, and Samuel one of the oldest, but they both were able to not only survive, but also to not completely avoid contact or a challenge on defense. 

As for the offense that turned the game around? Well, look no further than...

3. You Can Call Me Al

It was a rough first half for Al-Amir Dawes. After torching St. John's in the first game between the programs this season in Newark, he shot 1-for-7 in the opening 20 minutes, and also lost a couple of Red Storm 3-point shooters on defense.

But he was yet another example of how quickly things can change in this game. With the Pirates' backs to the wall, he responded with three huge threes in the big 18-4 game-changing run, including two on back-to-back possessions that forced Mike Anderson to call timeout.

“In the first half, I was a little bit anxious,” Dawes said after the game. “I was playing at a fast pace. After halftime, I just told myself that I needed to calm down, and do what I do.”

Dawes ended up with 18 second-half points in his 21-point night, and he was the biggest factor in the Pirates' win on the scoresheet if you just consider the final 20 minutes. But I would argue the biggest reason that Seton Hall won this game was the play of its floor leader.

4. Richie Richmond

Kadary Richmond really saved Seton Hall in this game. In the first half, he had six points and 10 boards, the MVP on paper in a half that featured balanced scoring. In the chaos that St. John's created in the opening stanza, Richmond continued to play within himself and keep his team in the game, and he knew his team needed that from him.

“My teammates are looking for my energy and leadership,” Richmond said of how he was able to keep his cool in the face of the heat of the moment.

He continued to do just that in the second half, too, ending up with a rock-solid stat line of 15 points, 13 rebounds, seven assists, and three steals while turning the ball over only three times. He is clearly becoming more confident with each big game he plays, and it's something that Shaheen Holloway preaches to him every day.

“Just not allowing me to be mediocre or accepting whatever comes,” Richmond said when asked how Holloway has pushed him. “And always wanting more, for myself and for my teammates.”

Holloway, of course, was Seton Hall's point guard more than 20 years ago. He has been in Richmond's shoes, and has been there to see his growth this season.

“I'm on him every single day about being the player that he wants to be,” Holloway said. “He has to bring it every single day, in practice and in games. I think he’s doing a better job of being more consistent with that, I thought tonight, he was really good rebounding. He controlled the game, he picked and chose his spots. I’m proud of him, but he’s got a long way to go. All night, I thought he defended and he didn’t take breaks. With this team, you can’t take breaks. I thought he defended, he was consistent on defense, and he rebounded the basketball for us.”

“Every single day, we just talk and I tell him every day, you have to understand the stigma that was on you before this year,” the Pirates' head coach added. “That’s there, people listen to that, people read that, and you gotta change that. And the way you change that is the way you play every single day, and it starts in practice. And to his credit, he’s carrying it out. I think he’s taken steps.”

5. A Team Grows In Queens

Richmond's performance in this game was honestly a microcosm of just how far Seton Hall has come as a team in conference play. Earlier this year, Holloway mentioned that his unit was by no means a finished product, and stressed the need to continue to get better, even as the Pirates started off slow in the rough-and-tumble Big East.

In short, this is not a game they would have won in December. They would not have battled through the foul trouble they did to hold the line, caught fire from the perimeter and roared back with a 52-point second half, and turned St. John's mistakes into gold (28 points off just 17 turnovers) like they did tonight earlier this year.

“I thought it was big for us,” Holloway said. “The first half, we were just kind of playing their game, just up and down, the way that they want to play. We had to slow it down and kind of get control of it. I thought once we did, Al made some shots, Kadary was just solid the whole game. We kind of mixed the defense up a little bit, and that’s what happened.”

A big credit also goes to the Seton Hall bench, specifically Harris and Davis, who ate up some big minutes when half the roster was in foul trouble. The Pirates ended up getting 26 big points off the pine, 10 of those from Harris, helping to bridge the gap in this game when David Jones and Posh Alexander gave the Red Storm a spark.

Seton Hall continues to be a team that learns and improves despite what it sometimes looks like on the floor, and that has to make fans excited for the coming homestretch of the season.

“We're in a good headspace,” Dawes added. “We have a lot of momentum, we just have to keep carrying it. That's what we've been talking about as a team.”