NEW YORK — The yearning of St. John’s to make a big run in the Big East tournament after more than two decades has reached an apex.
For several heartbeats late in the eighth-seeded Johnnies’ quarterfinal matchup with top-seeded and sixth-ranked Marquette, there was a murmur in the sellout crowd at Madison Square Garden that this could be the year.
The Red Storm gave Marquette everything it had Thursday, through 40 minutes of regulation and five minutes of overtime. But it just wasn’t enough for Mike Anderson’s crew to reach its first Big East semifinal in 23 years.
