A rollercoaster St. John’s season has been similarly up and down for Glenn Taylor Jr.
The 6-6 forward has been in and out of the Red Storm’s starting lineup, playing meaningful minutes in some games while riding the bench in others.
He enters Tuesday night’s must-win visit to DePaul on the upswing after leading St. John’s with 10 rebounds in a Feb. 25 victory against No. 15 Creighton and scoring a game-high 17 points in last Wednesday’s blowout of Butler.
“It’s not going to be high all the time,” Taylor said Monday. “The main thing was that I was trying to keep confidence in myself. … I stayed in the gym when things weren’t going well and I think that helped me out a lot. I feel like I found myself a lot this year, knowing I could go through adversity and stay positive.”
Taylor, a 21-year-old junior, transferred from Oregon State in May, joining a St. John’s roster that Rick Pitino overhauled after taking the head coaching job last March. Taylor started 18 of his 29 appearances this season but is averaging only 4.5 points in 17.7 minutes per game, down from his 11.6 points over 30.1 minutes with the Beavers last year.
His playing time plummeted as St. John’s slumped against the Big East, failing to record more than 11 minutes in any of the Red Storm’s seven games between Jan. 31 and Feb. 21. The Johnnies went 2-5 over that stretch and at one point lost eight of 10 games during conference play, delivering a blow to their NCAA Tournament hopes.
St. John’s has life, however, thanks to a three-game winning streak, including those double-digit victories over Creighton and Butler in which Taylor came up big.
“I saw in the Creighton game that they weren’t really boxing out, so I was just trying to attack the boards a lot,” Taylor said. “Against Butler, I just had open shots and I took them. My teammates were finding me and I knew that’s what we needed. Just coming into games, letting the game come to me and seeing what is needed of me at that time to win.”
Taylor played 32 minutes against Creighton and 30 minutes against Butler, helping fuel two of the Johnnies’ best wins of the year.
“He’s just a great team guy, but now he’s doing the things we expected of him,” Pitino said of Taylor after beating Butler. “His personality is so good. He’s so team oriented that he never really thinks about himself.”
St. John’s enters Tuesday with a 17-12 record, including 9-9 against the Big East. With the recent resurgence, St. John’s is now projected by Fox Sports’ Mike DeCourcy and CBS Sports’ Jerry Palm to be among the last four teams to make March Madness. ESPN’s Joe Lunardi still lists St. John’s among his first four teams to miss the Big Dance.
A win Tuesday against deplorable DePaul – which, at 0-18, sits dead last in the Big East – won’t much improve the Red Storm’s tournament hopes, though a loss would destroy them. Same goes for Saturday’s regular-season finale against 2-16 Georgetown at Madison Square Garden.
The Johnnies get a better chance to boost their résumé in next week’s Big East Tournament, where Taylor’s win-at-all-costs mentality could prove instrumental.
“I made a decision that I was going to keep it short and just play to win,” Taylor said. “I feel like I was thinking too much in those early games where I was off. I just decided to keep it short and allow my defense to translate to my offense.”
