The Hall Opens BIG EAST Play With Win Over St. John's

Sunday, December 30

South Orange, N.J.

1 p.m.

Seton Hall University

St. John's

St. John's (NY)

Seton Hall

The Hall Opens BIG EAST Play With Win Over St. John's

12/30/2018 5:05:00 PM | Women's Basketball

Box Score BOX (PDF)

SOUTH ORANGE, N.J. – The Seton Hall women's basketball team (9-3, 1-0 BIG EAST) opened conference play with a bang on Sunday, knocking off rival St. John's (7-5, 0-1 BIG EAST) by a score of 77-67 in front of 1,344 fans at a raucous Walsh Gym. Four Pirates scored in double-figures in the league lid-lifter, led by 19 from senior Inja Butina (Zagreb, Croatia).

The Pirates rallied from being down at the half for a second-straight game, erasing a six-point first quarter deficit and surging from one point down at the half to go up as many as 13 early in the fourth quarter. Joining Butina in double-figures were Nicole Jimenez (Miami, Fla.), Shadeen Samuels (Ossining, N.Y.) and Desiree Elmore (Hartford, Conn.) with 16, 15 and 12 points respectively.

Head Coach Anthony Bozzella on the Result:
"I thought in the second half we really turned up our defense and that helped us get into our pace. You could see in the fourth quarter we got them fatigued, our crowd was really into it and got us going so I'm so happy with them for that. That was a big win for us, opening with a win in the BIG EAST which is such a difficult league."

How it Happened
Down 19-13 after a quarter, The Hall used a 9-2 run capped by an Elmore lay-up to pull within a point midway through the second frame. The teams would go on to trade leads the rest of the quarter, with St. John's going to the break up 34-33.

The Red Storm would build its lead back to 42-39 with 6:53 to go in the third quarter but The Hall answered emphatically with an 8-0 run. Victoria Cardaci (Holmdel, N.J.) and Butina got the spurt started with back-to-back 3-pointers before Samuels capped it with a transition lay-in that put the Pirates up 47-2 and forced a St. John's timeout.

The Pirates maintained the multi-possession lead into the fourth quarter, then ripped off a 8-1 run sparked by 3-pointers from Kaity Healy (Freehold, N.J.) and Jimenez that gave The Hall its largest lead of the day at 64-51 with 7:39 to play. The Red Storm would come no closer than nine the rest of the way.

Inside The Numbers

The Pirates shot 40.3 percent from the floor and held St. John's to a 36.4 percent mark
- That number kicked up to 45.2 percent in the second half and 50.0 in the fourth quarter alone
The Hall was extremely efficient from the perimeter on both sides of the ball, shooting 9-of-18 from 3-point range while holding St. John's 4-of-16 from beyond the arc
The Pirates were +2 (19-17) in turnover margin and +5 (42-37) in rebounding
- Selena Philoxy (Queens, N.Y.) led the glass effort with a career-high 12 caroms, while Elmore and Samuels added nine and eight rebounds, respectively
- The Hall used 14 steals to force 19 turnovers, led by five from Jimenez and four from Butina
- The effort on the glass helped the Pirates to a 16-5 advantage in second chance points
The Hall assisted on 19 of its 25 field goals, a 78.0 percent mark, led by a team-high five assists from Butina

News and Notes

The Pirates improve to 4-2 in BIG EAST openers under Bozzella
The Hall is now 7-0 at home this season and 72-21 at Walsh Gym under Bozzella
Seton Hall has defeated St. John's in each of the team's last three meetings in South Orange
The Pirates finished with double-digit steals in a game for the ninth time this year
Jimenez has recorded 43 steals in 12 games, good for a league-best 3.6 per game
Butina is averaging 17.7 points over her last three outings after missing three games due to injury

What's Ahead
The Pirates travel to Indianapolis for its first BIG EAST road test of the season, taking on Butler on Friday, Jan. 4 at 7 p.m.