It started with \u2014 who else? \u2014 Zuby Ejiofor.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Seton Hall was on a run, and the Pirates fans \u2014 and the Connecticut ones who had arrived early \u2014 were getting loud.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A 19-point lead was down to six. There was still 4:41 left on the clock.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Then, Ejiofor ended the suspense.\u00a0<\/p>\n
He scored inside. He blocked a shot. His teammates joined him. Joson Sanon added two free throws, Dillon Mitchell came up with a steal and Bryce Hopkins hit two more at the line. Soon, it was a 7-0 run. <\/p>\n
St. John\u2019s wasn\u2019t going to blow this lead, or a chance at repeating as Big East Tournament champions.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI live for these moments, having the opportunity to win and advance,\u201d Ejiofor, the Big East Player of the Year<\/a>, said.\u00a0<\/p>\n Zuby Ejiofor attempts a shot during the St. John\u2019s game against Seton Hall on March 13, 2026. Robert Sabo for the NY Post<\/p>\n For the first time since 1999-2000, St. John\u2019s is headed to back-to-back conference tournament title games, after this hard-fought 78-68 victory over local rival and fourth seed Seton Hall at a sold-out MSG on Friday night. <\/p>\n A win on Saturday would mark the first time the program has won the tournament in consecutive years.\u00a0<\/p>\n It won\u2019t be easy. As expected, the Johnnies will see second-seeded Connecticut, a 67-51 winner over No. 11 Georgetown in the second semifinal. The league\u2019s two powers split the regular season series.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re playing for a championship,\u201d coach Rick Pitino said after St. John\u2019s won for the 18th time in their past 19 games. \u201cWe played for the regular season St. John’s one win away from Big East title repeat after staving off Seton Hall as if our life was on the line. We\u2019re going to play tomorrow as if our life is on the line.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Shaheen Holloway reacts during Seton Hall\u2019s loss to St. John\u2019s on March 13. Robert Sabo for the NY Post<\/p>\n Ejiofor improved to 6-1 in Big East Tournament games after finishing with 20 points and five rebounds. Sanon added 15 points and Mitchell (six rebounds, five assists) and Hopkins (seven rebounds, four assists) each had 13. Adam \u201cBudd\u201d Clark had 17 points and 11 assists for Seton Hall (21-12), which will likely miss the NCAA Tournament.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWalking over here I was asked how impressive it is to go to a second straight [Big East Tournament] title game. I said, \u2018Well, what\u2019s really impressive to me is to beat Seton Hall three times,\u2019\u201d Pitino said. \u201cThat is not easy to do because of the way they get after you.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n CHECK OUT THE LATEST BIG EAST STANDINGS<\/a> AND ST. JOHN\u2019S STATS<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n The start was almost an exact replay of Thursday\u2019s win over Providence, St. John\u2019s (27-6) racing out to an 8-0 lead, with all eight points coming inside. The Red Storm\u2019s first 20 points came in the paint. Seton Hall didn\u2019t let the Johnnies run away and hide immediately. <\/p>\n That happened later, with a pair of 11-0 runs.\u00a0<\/p>\n The first run, fueled by seven points from Sanon, enabled St. John\u2019s to take an eight-point lead into the break. The second one helped them blow it open. To start the second half, St. John\u2019s scored on its first four possessions, while holding the Pirates without a point on their five possessions. At that point, the lead was 19, and Seton Hall was on the ropes.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cCan\u2019t come out the way we came out,\u201d Seton Hall coach Shaheen Holloway said. \u201cCan\u2019t spot a good team 10 points early.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Dillon Mitchell attempts a shot during St. John\u2019s March 13 win over Seton Hall. Robert Sabo for the NY Post<\/p>\n Over the first 11:08 of the second half, Seton Hall managed just six points. The Pirates were held without a point over the first 5:35 of the stanza. <\/p>\n They did string together seven points in a row to get within 12 at the under-8 media timeout, and it was only a six-point game after an AJ Staton-McCray 3-pointer with 4:41 remaining. <\/p>\n But Ejiofor scored on the other end, and St. John\u2019s regained control.\u00a0<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\tYour weekly dispatch from the No. 1 source on the Johnnies\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSign up for Inside St. John’s by Zach Braziller, exclusively on Sports+.\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\tThank you\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n Now it\u2019s on to Saturday night, and a chance to repeat as Big East Tournament champions.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cFor us new guys who weren\u2019t part of the team last year, we want it just as bad,\u201d Mitchell said. \u201cWe have the same type of chip on our shoulder like we\u2019re defending it and we won it last year with them.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It started with \u2014 who else? \u2014 Zuby Ejiofor.\u00a0 Seton Hall was on a run, and the Pirates…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":654266,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[2076,30692,256597,62,1378,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-654265","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-college-basketball","9":"tag-rick-pitino","10":"tag-seton-hall-pirates","11":"tag-sports","12":"tag-st-johns-red-storm","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-unitedstates","15":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116225668865691631","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/654265","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=654265"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/654265\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/654266"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=654265"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=654265"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=654265"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}