RECAP: Although revenge can be the most satisfying form of justice it’s generally illegal in the United States, where the latter is meted out via the jury system, wherein two liars attempt to confound twelve morons as to what really happened. The ancients, who invented revenge, said that nothing is sweeter, but advise that it’s a dish best served cold or even best not served at all: that living well is the best revenge. Saint John’s has not lived well since last these two teams met – when Tulane bounced SJU from the NCAA tournament in 1992 – which makes yesterday’s meal served cold all the more satisfying. I’ve been waiting 23 years to say this: suck it Green Wave … Regarding the 25 point beat down SJU put on Tulane Sunday there’s not a lot about which even a curmudgeon like myself can complain. SJU came out with energy, put Tulane away early and kept them there. In doing so they looked as good as they’ve looked in a while. It didn’t hurt that Tulane was awful: 17 turnovers, 37 percent from the floor, 20 percent from three, and 45 percent from the free throw line (opponents are now 117 for 201 for the season). Some of that awfulness was a testament to SJU’s defense and some to Tulane’s incompetence. On their side of the ball SJ moved it well and made their shots for a change. Even Lavin displayed the routine competence that would be expected of a run of the mill D2 coach. In fact if it wasn’t for the clown suit he wears I wouldn’t have noticed him at all. Regarding Lavin’s coaching prowess colormoron Donny Marshall opined that he’s “one of the top ten or fifteen coaches in the game,” which no he’s not …Lavin has in Decembers past talked about preparing his team to play its best basketball in February. But in those past Decembers his teams sucked and his patter was intended to gull the rubes. We haven’t heard anything about February this December, where SJU has exceeded expectations. It’ll be interesting to see whether SJU can sustain their efforts moving into conference play or whether, come February, we’ll be talking about December. We should know better after January 6.
PLAYERS: Pointer had a career high 24 points and seven steals. Lavin credited himself for Pointer’s improved play, claiming that he’d threatened to redshirt Pointer in the spring as a motivational tool (h/t Rabinowitz) … Harrison had 21, moving into 4th in SJ history all time … Jordan had 12 points in only 22 minutes. Traveled a bunch of time and still looks to be pressing … Phil Greene was 3 for 8 and is 14 of 49 from the field over his last four … Obekpa got in early foul trouble again and wasn’t much of a factor, except perhaps psychologically. Eight rebounds, four blocks and three goal tends… Forgetting someone. Oh yeah, Jamal Branch … JDLR continues to impress in limited minutes. And that’s not even sarcasm. He plays with energy, throws his body around and seems willing to cripple a guy if it comes down to it. Now if I said he displays a deft touch on his free throws, that’d be sarcasm … Balamou played a bit and had a couple of baskets despite his evident fear of shooting …great white hope Jessica Albagovic got the biggest cheer of the night when he hit a three in garbage time
NOTES: Like this year’s team the seventh seeded SJU team that lost to Tulane in 1992 had been together four years: Malik Sealy, Robert “Tissue Paper” Werdann, PG Jason Buchanan and top 5 all-disappointment Chuck Sprolling were all seniors. They’d won an NIT championship as freshmen and lost to DoOk twice in the NCAA tournament, one of those the infamous Billy Singleton double technical game, the worst and most soul crushing loss in the conga line of futility that is Saint John’s basketball. Also on the roster were future NBAer Shawnelle Scott, a couple of large transfers called Lamont “You Dummy” Middleton and Mitch “Bananas” Foster, and sharpshooters Sergio Lyuk, Terrance Mullin and Lee Green. (That last bit was sarcasm as well.) As usual, I had them going to the final four. Also as usual, they lost in the first round. Instead Michigan , the 6-seed from their bracket, went to the championship game and lost to dEwk. Against Tulane Saint John’s went out to an early 10 point lead; by halftime they’d lost it and never got it back. Alleged shooting guard Chuck Sprolling was 1-7; Buchanan was 3 for 11; Scott was 2 for 9. Sealy, who was 6 of 7 in the first half shot 2 for 9 in the second and committed two turnovers in the last minute, including one that led to the winning basket. It was this team that finally convinced Louie that the game had passed him by. Which it had. He retired shortly thereafter … Tulane alumni include Robert Kennedy Toole, the author of A Confederacy of Dunces *, the great American novel. Unfortunately for Toole he could not get Dunces published in his lifetime. After numerous revisions it was rejected by Simon and Schuster editor Robert Gottlieb, who passed because, he said, “it isn’t really about anything.” Which pronouncement led Toole to destroy the manuscript and kill himself at age 32. After his death it was published by LSU Press when Toole’s overbearing mother brought a carbon of the manuscript to the novelist Walker Percy, then on the faculty, and begged him to read it. Percy agreed only to get the hysterical woman out of his office. In 1981 it won the Pulitizer Prize for fiction. (A BB analogy would be a coach, let’s call him Louie, refusing a college scholarship to a gifted HS player, let’s call him Julius, and then later, when he’s coach of the Nets, declining to sign him to a professional contract and then Julius goes to the Hall of Fame. It’s like that.) Gottlieb continued a distinguished career in which he produced books about something by such literary giants as Paul Simon, Sidney Poitier and Bob Dylan, and has gone on to a comfortable retirement in a fashionable apartment on the upper East Side where he’s penning his memoirs, for which no doubt he’ll receive a handsome advance. If the best revenge is living well he did, which would make the dish best served cold Toole, who ended up at room temperature, the moral of which is that there isn’t any justice, not really … I couldn’t find the Tulane game on youtube but here’s the 10th ranked 92 Redmen losing to Duke by 30, featuring Vitale at his slobbering best:
* “When a true genius appears, you can know him by this sign: that all the dunces are in a confederacy against him. ” — Jonathan Swift