Holiday Festival Day 1

We had the opportunity to go to Madison Square Garden four times already this season - for the Preseason NIT, the SEC/Big East Invitational, and the Jimmy V Classic. While the experience was great and the games even better, what most don't realize is that for bloggers like ourselves, events like this are a great opportunity to network.

One of the people we got a chance to meet there was Ray Floriani, a columnist at College Chalk Talk and a fellow member of Rush the Court's army of correspondents. Ray was able to battle the snow and made it to the Garden on Sunday for the first round of the Holiday Festival and was kind enough to do a write-up for us.

Ray will be popping up from time-to-time here at BIAH.

By Ray Floriani

NEW YORK CITY - With the white stuff courtesy of mother nature shoveled and tucked aside, duty called for a trip to the Garden and the Holiday Festival. Game one: Davidson-Cornell. How attractive a year ago with a certain guy named Curry burying jumpers. This contest with a struggling Davidson and good Cornell team gave us an OT classic.



Stat wise you would find it hard pressed to separate the two. Cornell led 44-31 at the break and was outscored by exactly the same score the final 20 minutes of regulation. Both teams had identical marks of 21 assists 11 turnovers, another exhibit of how well the game was played.

In the end result, separation came from Cornell’s Ryan Wittman, the game high scorer with 29 points. Wittman buried a long, beyond NBA, three as the buzzer sounded.

“I thought it was short,” he said, “but I’ll take it.”

In the nightcap, St. John’s built an early lead over Hofstra. In the season of giving, the Red Storm gave it back courtesy of a diet of jump shots (that missed). In the latter part of the second half with Hofstra leading by six, St.John’s toughened on defense and once again attacked the basket. They went on a decisive 12-0 run that sparked the 72-60 victory.

Hofstra notes pointed out the Pride as the winningest program in the NY area for this decade, In fact, Hofstra had a four game win streak over St. Johns from 2003-04 through 2006-07.

“This was big for us,” St.John’s junior swingman D.J. Kennedy said. “It shows we are headed in the right direction.”

Kennedy didn’t say it specifically but hinted the snapping of that four game series streak was nice.

The Storm showed they could be headed in the right direction. A year or two ago they probably lose this game once Hofstra took that half dozen point lead. With a little more maturity and experience, St. John’s found the resolve to dig down and find the way to win. Kennedy’s team leading 19 points and 15 boards helped.

Of added significance was off the bench contributions of junior guard Dwight Hardy (17 points) and junior forward Justin Brownlee (10 points, 13 rebounds). Charles Jenkins led all with 24 points, but the 6-3 Hofstra junior guard was defended closely down the stretch.

St. John’s is 9-1, the lone loss a competitive one to Duke at Cameron. Suddenly that November win over Temple in Philly’s Hoop Group Classic looks better each day. The next order of business is Cornell. A win in that one would give added momentum with Big East play right around the corner. Stay tuned.