BIG EAST GAME PREVIEW: UCONN AT ST. JOHN'S

St. John’s will look for an instant replay tonight as they try and upset the second straight top-10 opponent to visit Madison Square Garden in two home games. Back on January 3rd the Redstorm stunned Notre Dame, 71-65, behind DJ Kennedy’s double-double of 20 points and 10 rebounds. Tonight, Connecticut brings their lofty national ranking to the Garden and will look to leave with it intact.

Here are some pregame stories and previews found on the internet this morning:

Huskies Make Turn in Fine Form (Middletown Press)
Second Half of Season Starts Tonight (Norwich Bulletin)
Johnnies’ Rob Thomas Up to Huskie Task Tonight at Garden (NY Daily News)
Huskies Make the Turn (TheDay.com)
It’s Homecoming Day for Walker (TheDay.com)
Huskies Bracing for Back Nine (Connecticut Post)
UConn Plays St. John’s at the Garden (Courant)

UConn enters the contest with an overall record of 14-1 on the season and 3-1 in the Big East. The Huskies have rallied for three consecutive wins since opening conference play with a 74-63 home loss to Georgetown. This is the third and final leg of a three-game road swing for Jim Calhoun’s squad, coming up with a 61-55 win at West Virginia and an 81-72 win at Cincinnati.

In the victory at Cincinnati, AJ Price shook off the cobwebs from his perimeter game by pouring in 22 points and Jeff Adrien had another day at the office with a 13-point, 12-rebound double-double for the victors.

St. John’s hung with #1 Pittsburgh for the first half on Sunday afternoon in the Steel City before the Panthers overwhelmed SJU after intermission in a 90-67 loss for the ‘storm. SJU turned the ball over 24 times as they continue to miss point guard Malik Boothe.

As usual, expect a very large contingent of UConn fans to invade the Garden tonight, giving it a strong feeling of a game being played in Hartford, or even Storrs, when the two teams take the floor. The Huskies will also look to use their size and strength in the paint with 7’3 Hasheem Thabeet and Adrien to take away the scoring opportunities of SJU. Pressure from Price and freshman point guard Kemba Walker in pushing the pace of the game will also be a detriment to SJU who will be without a point guard. In the loss to Pitt, Quincy Roberts, a freshman filling in for Boothe, had just one assist against 8 turnovers.


The oddsmakers are listing the Huskies as 12 ½-point favorites, but that seems to be a road line, we feel UConn will feel much more at home than this line indicates and they should role and get their offense moving with some easy buckets and a stingy defense making things very hard on SJU. It will be quiet different than playing against Notre Dame…

NBE Blogger Prediction:

Connecticut 78
St. John’s 63