BIG EAST CONFERENCE MEN'S BASKETBALL TOURNAMENT

March 11, 2021

Rasheem Dunn

St. John's Red Storm

Madison Square Garden

Postgame Media Conference

Seton Hall 77, St. John's 69

THE MODERATOR: We're joined now by St. John's Rasheem Dunn.

Q. Rasheem, did they do anything different from Saturday to today that kind of confused you guys, you weren't ready for?

RASHEEM DUNN: I don't think -- they're a really good team. Sandro Mamu stepped up big for his team. He's a veteran doing what he's supposed to do. I think we were right there but we came up short. A lot of open shots we missed that we usually make but they just converted. We missed a lot of defensive assignments, and they converted on that.

Q. Can you tell whether it had to do with the environment that you guys were playing in, the poor shooting, what do you think it was about? The poor shooting, do you think it was about the environment playing because you guys haven't played here before, why do you think it happened?

RASHEEM DUNN: I don't think it had anything to do with the environment. Some teams just have that type of night. And tonight that was that night for us. The shots that we've been making all year, we had good looks, open threes, pull-ups, but it wasn't just falling. We couldn't do anything about it. It was just that type of night for us.

Q. How disappointed were you guys at the end of that?

RASHEEM DUNN: We were very disappointed, reason being because off the court as a team we went through a lot of adversity together. And I feel like this is a special group of kids and we all deserve to win. We all wanted to win. We have one goal and one mindset.

But it's very disappointing. We came and we just thought that we could take this whole thing. But things didn't work out like that.

Q. Obviously not having Isaih and Posh's first game back, he seemed a little rusty. How much do you think those two things were factors today?

RASHEEM DUNN: Not having Isaih, it kind of hurt us a bit. I mean I say it hurt us because Isaih he gave us much more length inside. Post presence. So and Posh, his finger -- I mean his finger's kind of messed up. Him just getting back in a groove, him not practicing for a while and not playing -- missing the last two games. So he kind of had to get himself back in the groove.

This game here, it was kind of tough. Like I say, he didn't play for two games. He didn't practice a lot. But the team is going to be really special in the future.

Q. I was just wondering, going into the half you guys had six steals in five minutes. And even midway through the second half you went up by two, 62-60. Would you classify this more as a game that you thought you lost compared to Seton Hall had won?

RASHEEM DUNN: Yeah, I would say this game was more so us. Don't get it confused, Seton Hall is a very great team. Like I said previously, their seniors, they stepped up. Mamu, Rhoden, he had a great game, so he led them. But I would say it was more so on us. We didn't let -- we didn't get back to our identity. We usually get after teams and try to speed them up and let our defense go into offense. But I think tonight we did it in one half instead of two halves.

Q. In overtime Seton Hall really controlled most of those final five minutes. What do you think was the reason why Seton Hall was able to pull away late?

RASHEEM DUNN: I guess I could say they wanted it more than us I guess. It shows out there on the court, you guys watching the game. They just played hard. We were late on a lot of -- like I said before -- defensive assignments. Yeah, they just wanted it more than us.