VILLANOVA, Pa. — Throughout the winning streak, St. John’s found new and inventive ways to win. It did it with defense, with rebounding, with toughness.

Most of all, it willed itself past the opposition in crunch time, making the difference-making play the opposition didn’t.

Wednesday night, the reverse happened. It was Villanova who made the big plays when it mattered most. Villanova who hit 3-pointers with the shot clock winding down. Villanova who grabbed key offensive rebounds.

“Every loss is frustrating,” senior wing Aaron Scott said after St. John’s lost for the first time since New Year’s Eve, 73-71, to Villanova at Finneran Pavilion. “We’re not losers. We don’t like losing.”

The ninth-ranked Johnnies’ first trip to the top 10 of the Associated Press poll in 25 years might turn out to be short-lived.

It rallied from 11 down in the second half to take the lead, but it couldn’t finish off Villanova like it has so many other opponents and saw its lead atop the big East over Creighton sliced to a single game.

The teams meet Sunday afternoon at the Garden.

Tyler Perkins’ 3-pointer with 9 seconds left proved to be the difference. Simeon Wilcher, who had given the Red Storm the lead on the previous possession, missed on the other end at the horn.

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Afterward, coach Rick Pitino was focused on a few key rebounds his players didn’t get: a Jordan Longino board led to an Eric Dixon 3-pointer that broke a 62-all tie with 4:26 to go, and an Enoch Boakye offensive rebound preceded by two Longino free throws that extended the lead to four with 2:27 remaining.

“It was the [not] blocking out twice with the game on the line that hurt us,” Pitino said.

It was a rare subpar defensive effort from the Johnnies, the usual tenacity missing on that end of the floor.

They allowed Villanova to shoot 53.1 percent from the field and hit 11 of 24 attempts from beyond the arc. Like the first meeting, they struggled to contain Wooga Poplar (22 points) off the dribble, and Villanova made them pay for doubling Dixon.

“We weren’t there defensively, and that’s our identity. I don’t know [why],” Scott said. “They have some good players on their team, but we just weren’t there defensively.”

Scott led St. John’s (21-4, 12-2) with 22 points, and Kadary Richmond added 17 points and 10 assists. Wilcher and RJ Luis each had 12.

It was a very atypical St. John’s performance, from the defensive effort to the offensive shot selection.

It attempted a season-high 37 3-pointers and made 11.

Villanova (15-10, 8-6) packed it in and limited the Red Storm to 16 points in the paint.

Center Zuby Ejiofor attempted just four shots in 36 minutes.

“You got to take them,” Pitino said. “People are going to give it to us, we got to have the confidence to take them. We lost because we didn’t block out, we were not good guarding the ball and they shot 52 percent from the field, 45 from 3. They deserved the victory.”

Despite so much going wrong, St. John’s was there to steal the game at the end. It had the ball down two when Wilcher released his 3-pointer. Considering how this magical season has gone, you almost expected it to fall. But it didn’t, and St. John’s tasted defeat for the first time in 2025.

“It was a clean look, I just didn’t make it,” Wilcher said. “I’m not really hanging my head too low about it because we have a big game coming up this weekend and we have to prepare for that.”