Mike Anderson has already claimed the most non-conference wins by a first-year St. John’s coach. Nine have come by double-digits. The other resulted in West Virginia’s only loss.
The undersized and unproven team with three new starters has proven to be deeper, tougher and more cohesive than anyone imagined two months ago.
Still, St. John’s (10-2) sat at 69th in the official NCAA NET rankings, entering Saturday. It placed 91st on the KenPom analytics site.
Come Saturday night, the Red Storm have the chance to change perception again.
Entering the Basketball Hall of Fame Al Attles Classic with six straight wins, St. John’s faces No. 16 Arizona at the Chase Center in San Francisco in its first matchup against a ranked opponent this season. It is the Red Storm’s final game before the Big East opener against No. 17 Butler on Dec. 31 and first game outside of the Tri-state area this season.
The Wildcats (10-2) have dropped two of their past three games, but have yet to lose to any team currently ranked outside the Top 10.
“That’s going to be a tremendous challenge,” Anderson said. “I want to see what our guys do in terms of their game traveling [out West]. Can you bring that same kind of intensity offensively? Can we execute?
“They have some tremendous players … Size, quickness, they’re one of the top scoring teams in the country, rebounding teams, shooting teams, so it’s a big challenge. I’m sure our guys are looking forward to the opportunity to go out and just trying to contend to find out where we are at this time of the year.”
In addition to featuring one of the country’s most talented backcourts (Nico Mannion, Josh Green), Arizona’s frontcourt combines 6-foot-10 senior Chase Jeter and 6-foot-11 Zeke Nnaji, who is averaging 15.9 points and 7.6 rebounds, while shooting nearly 69 percent from the field.
The debut of 6-foot-9 Ian Steere comes just in time.
With Mustapha Heron expected to miss his second straight game — the senior hasn’t practiced since spraining his right ankle on Dec. 10, though Anderson optimistically called him a “game-time decision” — Steere will suit up for the first time since playing one game at NC State last season.
The former four-star recruit joins Josh Roberts as the only St. John’s players taller than 6-foot-7.
“I’m really just looking forward to seeing him go out there and seeing the things he can do,” Anderson said. “He obviously brings some size and brings some athletic ability. I’ve seen it in practice, but the big key for a coach is seeing it in a game setting. Hopefully, he can give us another guy with size. We got some guys that can cause trouble and we play small ball at times, but maybe he can give us a skilled big guy that can go out and hopefully give us some good minutes.”
