Red Storm surges in 2nd half to rout Neb.
Joel Soriano had 17 points, 18 rebounds and three blocks, David Jones added 15 points and eight rebounds and St. John’s scored 50 second-half points to rally past Nebraska 70-50 on Thursday night at Carnesecca Arena in the Gavitt Tipoff Games.
St. John’s had just 20 points in the first half before scoring 24 of the opening 30 points after halftime.
“We just weren’t knocking down shots and I felt like we were settling,” Soriano said. “When we were down at halftime, we got together after and we talked about it.”
St. John’s made its first 3-pointer of the game with 17:09 remaining in the second half to take its first lead, 30-27, since 6-4. It came during St. John’s 18-3 run to open the second half. Jones made 3-pointers on back-to-back possessions to make it 44-33.
“In the second half, I thought we got into a better rhythm with our defense,” St. John’s coach Mike Anderson said. “That created some opportunities on the offensive end. I thought we settled down, and hopefully that’s something we can bottle up going forward.”
Posh Alexander scored 13 points for St. John’s (4-0).
Keisei Tominaga was the lone double-digit scorer for Nebraska (2-1) with 15 points. Sam Griesel, Nebraska’s leading scoring coming in at 20 points per game, made his first field goal of the game with 8:28 remaining in the second half and finished with six points.
Nebraska led 27-20 at the break after holding St. John’s to 23.4 percent shooting, including 0-for-10 from 3-point range. The Red Storm had eight field goals in the first half and 10 turnovers.