College Basketball Roundup : Mullin Scores 31 to Boost St. John’s

Chris Mullin overcame a first-half slump and finished with a season-high 31 points in leading No. 1-ranked St. John’s to a 93-80 victory over DePaul before a record crowd of 6,597 in Alumni Hall on the St. John’s campus in New York Sunday.

The Redmen struggled for 34 minutes before they started to play well. It was their 17th straight victory.

In the first half, Mullin made only 2-of-10 field-goal attempts and missed seven straight shots as the Redmen trailed, 38-34, at intermission. But the 6-foot-6 Olympian made seven-of-seven shots in the second half and scored 24 points.

Mullin finished with nine field goals in 17 attempts. He also hit 13 of 15 free throws.

“I took better shots in the second half and tried to get the ball a little closer,” Mullin said. “But today was Ron Stewart’s day.”

Stewart, a 6-8 senior forward who started 13 games last year, came off the bench when 7-foot Bill Wennington got into foul trouble. He contributed eight points and seven rebounds in 24 minutes.

The Redmen (22-1) outscored the Blue Demons, 22-5, during one stretch in the second half, running off 10 straight points.

Still, they seemed in trouble when Wennington went out with his fourth personal six minutes into the second half and the game still tight. But Stewart did so well that when Coach Lou Carnesecca decided to send Wennington back in, the big center said no.

“He’s doing the job,” Wennington said he told Carnesecca about Stewart. “We’ve got our momentum. He’s doing as good a job as I could do.”

St. John’s led by only seven, 73-68, with 6:08 left, but then it went on a 10-0 spurt, with Mullin contributing six.

For DePaul (15-8) it was the fifth loss in seven games. The Blue Demons were ranked second in the nation at the start of the season but dropped out of the national rankings last week.

“That’s the kind of year we’re having,” Coach Joey Meyer said. “Anybody can beat us. Louie (Carnesecca ) might have come off the bench and hurt us. Stewart played better than Wennington.”

Meyer added: “We were in a position to win with eight minutes to go, but we didn’t make the good plays. St. John’s is obviously a great team. Mullin hurt us in the second half. They killed us off the boards.”

Actually, St. John’s out-rebounded DePaul only 40-37 and shot 47% to DePaul’s 45%.

Walter Berry had 19 points for St. John’s, Willie Glass 13 and Mike Moses 11. Dallas Comegys led DePaul with 20 points, followed by Tyrone Corbin with 18. Corbin also had 11 rebounds.

Clemson 71, Maryland 64--Vincent Hamilton scored 20 points as the Tigers defeated the Terrapins, ranked 19th and 20th, in an Atlantic Coast Conference game at Clemson, S.C.

Hamilton, a senior guard, also pulled down 10 rebounds. Clemson made eight of eight free throws in the last 63 seconds to secure the win, with Hamilton throwing in two of those.

The loss denied Maryland Coach Lefty Driesell his 500th coaching victory for the third straight game. He gets his next opportunity Tuesday night against Georgia Tech in Atlanta.

Clemson is now 15-8 overall, 5-6 in the conference, Maryland fell to 19-9, 5-5.

Maryland’s Keith Gatlin, who hit 14 of 15 field-goal attempts, led all scorers with 28 points.

Houston 96, Rice 91--Greg Anderson scored a career-high 29 points to lead the Cougars in a Southwest Conference game at Houston and help offset outstanding performances by Greg Hines and Tony Barnett of Rice. Hines scored 36 points, Barnett 34.

Houston is now 15-9, 7-5, while Rice dropped to 9-14, 2-11.