Which was sweeter?

[hoops22]

Beating exCuse by 40 at the Dome last year, or beating Dook by 4 at the Garden this year? Tough one to call.

[sju88grad]

For me, this one is much sweeter. Long losing streak, MSG, sell out crowd, National TV and against the evil empire!

[xusandy]

WOW! Nice job St. John's. After the Johnnies gave X two big scares, I'm just glad we don't have to play them again! So how many league "upsets" can this team pull off before March?

[BEXU]

Not so fast, we could face them in the BET

[EMT]

How was the crowd?

I was listening on the radio and it sounded like there was a lot of Duke fans there when they were coming back.

[Bill Marsh]

WOW! Nice job St. John's. After the Johnnies gave X two big scares, I'm just glad we don't have to play them again! So how many league "upsets" can this team pull off before March?

A lot. Could be a very dangerous team. They’ve had to adjust to the loss of LoVett and still played the best in the BE tough during their losing streak. They may finally have figured out how to win without Marcus.

[adoraz]

EASILY Duke. Not even close IMO.

For both games, we entered the game with virtually no hope of making the tournament. Last year's W didn't result in the NIT, and this year's Duke win is unlikely to as well.

So, here are the advantages of each:

Syracuse:
+Crazy record breaking blowout win on the road
+Against a local rival
+Arguably more embarrassing for Cuse than the W over Duke was for Duke

Duke:
+Nail bitter at home and an amazing experience for our fans there
+Far more exciting crowd, especially being split
+On Fox as opposed to FS1
+Lots of recruits at the game
+Coming off an 11 game losing streak made it a lot more dramatic
+Duke is ranked #4, Syracuse wasn't ranked
+Duke is arguably the most successful/popular/hated team in the nation
+++This game got wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy more attention than the Syracuse game. I mean, it's STILL the top story on ESPN Men's Basketball:

http://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketball/

I'm sure I can think of more positives, but this W feels a million times better.

[MullinMayhem]

Easily the Duke win. The Cuse wins are always nice, but Cuse has been down for a while. Yes they went on a miracle Final Four run a few years ago, but they have not been anywhere close to where they used to be in the regular season. They used to be a top 15 team consistently in the old Big East. They don't get ranked anymore. So it was a nice win but nothing crazy. Duke is always a legitimate title contender and they're always in the top 5. They are arguably the best program in the country in the past 30 years or so with one of the best coaches ever.

Us beating #4 Duke at the sold out Garden under the bright lights on FOX national brought tons of eyeballs and St. John's was literally on every front page for college hoops websites i.e. SI.com, ESPN, etc. They also mentioned our upset in every college basketball game over the weekend. Don't get me wrong, we are having an awful year overall but for one day St. John's was back to being nationally relevant and in the top headlines for a GOOD reason! I think Duke came in sleepwalking expecting us to roll over. They came into the Garden looking like fried chicken and we hadn't eaten in a week desperate for food. The hungry team won. Will be really interesting to see how the team responds after this historic win. I'm putting my ticket stub from this game in a protector...one of the biggest wins in program history in terms of a single game.

[DudeAnon]

Easily the Duke win. The Cuse wins are always nice, but Cuse has been down for a while. Yes they went on a miracle Final Four run a few years ago, but they have not been anywhere close to where they used to be in the regular season. They used to be a top 15 team consistently in the old Big East. They don't get ranked anymore. So it was a nice win but nothing crazy. Duke is always a legitimate title contender and they're always in the top 5. They are arguably the best program in the country in the past 30 years or so with one of the best coaches ever.

Us beating #4 Duke at the sold out Garden under the bright lights on FOX national brought tons of eyeballs and St. John's was literally on every front page for college hoops websites i.e. SI.com, ESPN, etc. They also mentioned our upset in every college basketball game over the weekend. Don't get me wrong, we are having an awful year overall but for one day St. John's was back to being nationally relevant and in the top headlines for a GOOD reason! I think Duke came in sleepwalking expecting us to roll over. They came into the Garden looking like fried chicken and we hadn't eaten in a week desperate for food. The hungry team won. Will be really interesting to see how the team responds after this historic win. I'm putting my ticket stub from this game in a protector...one of the biggest wins in program history in terms of a single game.

So Mayhem, now that you have tasted some victory can you acknowledge that this Johnnies team is not awful just had Lovett bail on the team and lost a lot of close games. If the core sticks around this team will be NCAA bound next year, not to mention them making a possible run in the BET this year. BTW, St. John's had the 2nd worst "Luck" factor next to DePaul. https://kenpom.com/index.php?s=RankLuck I don't actually consider it luck (or bad luck), just experience in closing out games.

[MullinMayhem]

Anon, I think it's still too soon to tell. It depends how we respond after that W. If we suddenly start closing out games and we get 3-4 wins and win a game or two in the BET then yes, we aren't terrible and the theory that our record is due to no bench and no LoVett holds some water. No one wants Mullin to succeed more than me, but the Duke win doesn't change the fact that many betting men would bet their money against him leading us back to glory by himself. I think the X factor is getting a good assistant with tons of experience. If we can get that for next year and he works well with Mullin and the players, then maybe the Mullin experiment can work. But if nothing is done and it's still just zero experience on our coaching staff, we will again have a bad year next season. Time will tell if this was just a game we got up for or if it's a real turning point in the Mullin experiment. Next year is Mullin's super bowl. It's all or nothing. Depth will be there, experience will be there, it will be his 4th year, and our players have been able to gel. If we fail next year (I'd say failure is anything other than an NCAA tourney berth) then it has to be the coaching staff.