Urgency is rising for St. John’s to begin playing like the top-ten team they were picked to be in the preseason poll. Their opponents on Saturday night weren’t rated as highly as the Red Storm from the onset, but they are also hoping for a better start. Ole Miss has lost three straight games and is on the hunt for their first big win of the season, with former Johnny AJ Storr making his return to New York for the first time in more than two years.
Game information
Who: No. 23 St. John’s Red Storm (4-3) vs. Ole Miss Rebels (5-3)
Advertisement
When: Saturday, December 6, 2025, 8:00 p.m.
Where: Madison Square Garden, New York, New York
TV: Peacock
Radio: ESPN New York 880 / 1050
Series History: St. John’s won its only meeting against Ole Miss in the first round of the 1989 NIT, defeating the Rebels by a score of 70-67 inside Alumni Hall/Carnesecca Arena on March 15, 1989.
KenPom Predicted Score: St. John’s to win 82-72 (82 percent chance of win)
Injury news
There are no injury news to report for St. John’s entering Saturday night’s game.
What to watch for in the Storm
Going South – Rick Pitino joked about St. John’s joining the Southeastern Conference after scheduling three different teams in the preseason, but the Johnnies have won as many games against the SEC as one of its former members Sewanee. In fact, St. John’s has a seven-game losing streak against SEC competition, having last beaten one of its teams on November 29, 2012, when they blew out South Carolina. Saturday night’s game against the slipping Rebels might be their best chance at breaking that 13-year streak.
Advertisement
Boarded Up – The Johnnies’ rebounding story is a peculiar one. They are once again ranked in the top-20 with a 39.1% offensive rebound percentage, but are also allowing opponents to pull down offensive rebounds at a 36.4% rate. This year’s team is on pace to be the least effective St. John’s team on the defensive glass since the 2011-12 season, when they didn’t roster a single player taller than 6-foot-8. The Red Storm’s woes on boards don’t seem sustainable given their success on the offensive glass, but it needs to change soon, whether that means playing taller lineups more frequently or guards Joson Sanon and Ian Jackson stepping up.
Wizard of Oz’ – Not including the frigid 1-of-7 game he had against Auburn in which he still took high-quality shots, Oziyah Sellers had a miniature breakout in his first two games at the Players’ Era Festival. He scored 20 or more points and drilled five threes in each of his games against Iowa State and Baylor, shooting 76.9% from three over those two contests. The Rebels allow opponents to shoot 34.6% from three, ranking 232nd in the country, so Oziyah Sellers could put on another three-point clinic on Saturday night.
Scouting the Rebels
Acrimony is bubbling over in Oxford, and we are not talking about what has unfolded in Ole Miss’s football program this week. The Rebels are in the midst of a three-game losing streak after a 5-0 start against predominantly mid-major competition, falling to Iowa and Utah (who is ranked 121st in KenPom) at the Palm Springs Invitational, then losing to Miami at home on Wednesday night.
Advertisement
In that 75-66 defeat to the Hurricanes, they were crushed on the boards and outrebounded, 45-29. When old friend of the Red Storm program AJ Storr (who we will talk about later) was asked about how the Rebels can address their perceived lack of effort in Wednesday’s postgame press conference, head coach Chris Beard interjected, “We could play different players”.
Yikes.
As ugly as this stretch seems, Ole Miss is very much alive in the tournament picture: they are still ranked 52nd in KenPom, have a laundry list of opportunities for great wins in the SEC, and the Rebels have the characteristics of a good team when you look under the hood.
Advertisement
The Rebels rank 63rd nationally in turnover percentage (14.9%), are the 49th-best three-point shooting team in the country (37.5%), and stand at 65th in finishing their free throws (75.9%). They also have the fifth-best block percentage in the nation (18.4%).
We couldn’t start without talking about the aforementioned and well-traveled AJ Storr. Not so long ago, the four-star high school recruit by way of Kankakee High School, Bishop Gorman High School, AZ Compass Prep, and IMG Academy was one of the lone bright spots on a rudderless St. John’s team playing out the string of Mike Anderson’s final season in Queens. Earning a place on the All-Big East Freshman team for the 2022-23 season, Storr averaged 8.8 points, 1.9 rebounds, and 0.8 assists and shot 43.4% from the field and 40.4% from three.
Storr was not in head coach Rick Pitino’s plans when he took the job at St. John’s and was one of the many departures from the team. He transferred to Wisconsin, where he blossomed into one of the conference’s brightest stars. With the Badgers, he scored a team-high 16.8 points and led them to a 5-seed in the NCAA Tournament, where they were upset by James Madison.
Advertisement
Following a trend in his career, Storr once again packed his bags and sought new digs, heading to Kansas for his junior year with hopes of solidifying his NBA draft stock. Unfortunately, Storr never quite found a role with the Jayhawks and saw his stock tank. He averaged a career-worst 6.1 points and struggled to find his shot, shooting 38.4% from the field and 29.1% from three.
Now playing for his eighth team in eight years, Storr is hoping to reclaim the hype he enjoyed in his sophomore year and become the lethal knockdown shooter he was projected to be coming out of high school. So far, it’s a return to form for the Illinois native, averaging a team-high 13.8 points and shooting 47.3% from the field and 52.0% from three. Defense and playmaking were never Storr’s calling cards, so if he can become the effective microwave scorer he was expected to be in Oxford, he is doing his job.
Those playmaking responsibilities are in the hands of 22-year-old French freshman Ilias Kamardine, who is one of the many incoming international players coming stateside this college basketball season. Kamardine is a two-way sharpshooter who has playing experience with JDA Dijon in LNB Pro A, the top-flight professional league in France, where he averaged 8.0 points, 2.9 assists, and shot 39.8% from three off the bench in the 2024-25 season.
So far this season, Kamardine is building a case to be an All-SEC player, averaging 13.8 points, a team-best 4.9 assists, 1.8 steals, 1.0 blocks, and is shooting 49.4% from the field, 37.5% from three, and 69.6% on free throws. Standing at 6-foot-5 with a reported 6-foot-10 wingspan, Kamardine could provide trouble for Joson Sanon, Ian Jackson, and Oziyah Sellers along the perimeter.
Stretch big Malik Dia moves fluidly for a 6-foot-9 forward and acts as a secondary ball-handler who is not afraid to shoot off the dribble. In his senior season, the Tennessee native is averaging 12.5 points, 5.9 rebounds, and 1.0 assists. Dia isn’t shooting the rock as effectively through eight games as his three-point percentage from a career rate of 34.4% to 25.0% to open the season, but don’t expect that to shake his confidence. The frontcourt trio of Ejiofor, Mitchell, and Hopkins will need to close out early against Dia, or else he will fire away.
Alongside Dia in the frontcourt is Louisville transfer James Scott, who plays as a traditional big man. The 6-foot-11 center is averaging 5.8 points and 6.1 rebounds (2.5 offensive boards) through eight games. Scott is currently the all-time two-point shooting percentage leader in Division I men’s basketball with a 77.0% career rate, though his efficiency has nosedived to… 65.6 percent this season.
Advertisement
High Point transfer Kezza Giffa started most games in an off-ball role, averaging 7.5 points and shooting 50% from three, but came off the bench and only played in five minutes in the Rebels’ loss to Miami. Other names to know are freshman four-star guard Patton Pinkins (8.0 ppg / 52.4% FG / 50.0% 3P), LSU transfer forward Corey Chest (2.9 ppg / 3.8 reb / 47.4% FG), and Louisville transfer Koren Johnson (2.8 ppg / 38.5% FG) — a guard who averaged 11.1 points and 2.7 assists in his last fully healthy season with Washington in 2023-24.
Prediction
It’s tough to count out a Rick Pitino-led team that is coming off a 10-day break and is playing at home, especially when they’re facing a team that just played on Wednesday and is traveling on its second-longest road trip this regular season. Yes, St. John’s has struggled with SEC teams in recent memory, but the Rebels do not have a game-breaking guard like Labaron Philon or Tahaad Pettiford, and their perimeter defense might be more concerning than the Red Storm’s.
There are no excuses here and Rick Pitino should have his team prepared. St. John’s wins, 80-73.
