Villanova Holds Off St. John's in Overtime, 79-76

Filed under Game Recap on January 21st, 2012

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On January 21st, the Wildcats turned it up a notch at a neutral site and narrowly beat the Red Storm, 79-76, in overtime.

Maalik Wayns put up the most points against the Red Storm with 28 on 55% shooting from the floor in 43 minutes. Mouphtaou Yarou helped the cause by topping everyone with 13 rebounds.

A couple key stats coming into the game: The Villanova RPI ranking was higher than St. John's (#90 to #148). On the road, the Wildcats don't play so well, but the Red Storm were not playing well and had lost 4 out of 5. Last season, Villanova lost 81-68. In the last four years of the series, the Wildcats are 4-1. Since 1980, the Villanova record against St. John's is 29-29.

Villanova defeated St. John's while showing domination in offensive rebounding, and also came out ahead in three pointers.

Villanova made a huge difference on the glass, 24 offensive rebounds to eight. Villanova leaned on three-pointers for the win and got 18 points from its efforts as opposed to 12 for St. John's. A big highlight for Villanova was the 24 offensive rebounds, which was far better than its season average of 14.1.

Nova Players Mins Pts Reb Ast Stl Blk TO A+ Dominic Cheek 38 20 7 3 3 1 2 A Maalik Wayns 43 28 2 3 2 0 7 B+ J. Pinkston 38 13 12 0 2 1 7 B Markus Kennedy 10 2 5 1 0 0 0 B Mouphtaou Yarou 34 4 13 0 1 0 1 C+ James Bell 41 10 6 0 4 0 6 C- Darrun Hilliard 11 2 1 1 0 0 0 - Ty Johnson 7 0 0 2 0 0 0

SJU Players Mins Pts Reb Ast Stl Blk TO A M. Harkless 45 16 7 2 2 4 5 A S. Pointer 39 8 9 3 3 1 2 A Phil Greene 41 14 4 5 2 0 3 B+ D. Harrison 31 28 1 0 1 1 5 B Amir Garrett 28 8 7 2 1 0 1 D G. Achiuwa 32 2 1 0 1 1 4 - Malik Stith 9 0 1 0 0 0 1

The Wildcats have moved up to 10-10. They've now moved up to 11th place in the Big East with a conference record of 3-5. And they've now won 3 of their last 5 games.

Next up is Louisville on the road on January 25th.

• This was the 3rd foul out of the season for JayVaughn Pinkston
• Villanova has played in 2 overtime games this season. Over the last 5 seasons the Wildcats have played in 6 overtime games with a record of 5-1.
• This marks the 15th 20-point game of Maalik Wayns's career.
• The Wildcats have won 100% of the time this season (5-0) after recording 79 or more total points.
• James Bell recorded a team season high in steals with 4.

• This marks the 5th 20-point game of D`Angelo Harrison's career.
• St. John's lost and did not cover the spread.
• The top two rebounders (Sir`Dominic Pointer and Maurice Harkless) accounted for 44.4% of the rebounds.
• The Red Storm have lost 2 times this season in games decided by 5 or fewer points. Since 2006, St. John's has lost 15 close games.
• D`Angelo Harrison accounted for 36.8% of the team's points.

Check out the complete Games Notes

Tags: Maalik Wayns, Mouphtaou Yarou