Late rally not good enough as St. John’s falls to Xavier 74-66

St. John’s hosted No. 10/12 Xavier Wednesday Night in Carnesecca, in what would prove to be a great game. The Johnnies had trimmed a 12 point deficit with 7 minutes left to play all the way to 1, before a 9-2 by Xavier to seal the win. The final score was 74-66.

Standout freshman point guard, Federico Mussini added another great game to his college career draining five three pointers. He would finish with 19 points. Ron Mvouika also contributed a season-high 19 points and Durand Johnson added 12 points.

For Xavier, Myles Davis scored a team-high 19 points t and Trevon Bluiett added 18. Overall, Xavier shot 48.0 percent (24-of-50) from the floor and 22-of-29 (75.9 percent) from the free throw line. Xavier now improves to 14-1, and the Johnnies fell to 7-9.

Xavier had the lead the whole game and a comfortable one as well until the Johnnies went on a 18-7 run, that energized the whole building and its 4,168 fans. Mussuni had 12 of the 18 points during the run, draining four straight three-pointers. With Xavier up four, Mussuni hit another three to narrow the deficit to one. However, key free throws and a poor technical foul by the Johnnies. allow Xavier to pull away.

After the game Mullin was happy with the way his team has improved over the last month and would go on to say, “There has been tremendous improvement across the board. We’re not here to get a workout, we’re here to win. We practice hard to set that standard of work ethic and accountability. I let these guys know how much they are improving. We’re light years ahead of where we were a month ago.”

The Johnnies will be back in action Saturday as they take on Marquette at 2 P.M.