Bad Call Costs St. John's

[grunewar]

A cut and paste excerpt from Today's Post:

Not even 40 points from guard Chris Wright could help No. 4 St. John's overcome a blown call at a the most crucial moment against Mount St. Joseph last night in the Battle of the Beltways doubleheader.

In a matchup between two of the best private school teams in Washington and Baltimore, Mount St. Joseph forward Dino Gregory made a controversial, game-tying three-pointer at the end of regulation, and the Gaels pulled away in overtime for a 69-65 comeback victory in front of a capacity crowd of more than 2,000 at American University's Bender Arena.

"You could tell that [Gregory's shot] didn't count," Wright said, "but that's how it goes."

With St. John's leading 57-54 with sixth-tenths of a second remaining in regulation, Mount St. Joseph forward Chris Olsen threw a long pass from under his own basket to Gregory, who caught the ball with his back to the goal, about two feet inside the three-point arc at the top of the key. Gregory faked, spun and fired a shot that banked in.

The referees ruled the basket a game-tying three-pointer, but television replays -- the game was televised on ESPNU -- clearly showed that Gregory was straddling the three-point line when he released the shot. It was also clear that Gregory had not launched the shot when time expired.

"Honestly, I didn't know you could get a shot off in six-tenths of a second," said Wright, a Georgetown recruit. "The guy appeared to be in front of the line and the shot was after the buzzer and it went in. It kind of took the wind out of us."

The three officials conferred after the play, and the call stood. High school rules prevent the use of television monitors to review calls. St. John's Coach Paul DeStefano's attempted to convince the officials to use the television replays to no avail.

"In high school, you [normally] don't have a monitor, but in this situation, we had a monitor," DeStefano said. "So what do you want to do? Do you want to get it right? Or do you want to guess and not be sure?"

Mount St. Joseph, the No. 2 team in the Baltimore Sun's rankings, was happy to accept the good fortune after trailing for most of the game.

"I think it was a three-pointer," Gregory said. "The official said it was, so it was."