Richmond, Smith lead the way as No. 10 St. John’s pounds DePaul 82-58

Kadary Richmond had 17 points and 9 rebounds, Deivon Smith scored 18 and No. 10 St. John's matched its highest Big East win total in 26 years, beating DePaul 82-58 on Wednesday night.

Sadiku Ibine Ayo scored a career-high 15. Zuby Ejiofor chipped in with 13 points and 9 rebounds, helping St. John's win for the 12th time in 13 games.

In their second season under Hall of Fame coach Rick Pitino, the first-place Red Storm (23-4, 14-2) equaled its highest conference win total since the 1998-99 team went 14-4 in league play. They lead No. 16 Marquette and Creighton by 2½ games.

Isaiah Rivera led DePaul with 16 points, but the last-place Blue Demons (11-16, 2-14) lost for the seventh time in eight games.

Takeaways

St. John's: The Red Storm got an easy win even though star RJ Luis Jr. missed the game because of a pulled groin.

DePaul: Chris Holtmann inherited a big job when he was hired to rebuild a once-proud program. Games like this show just how much work he has to do.

Key moment

It was tied at 20 when Ayo and Simeon Wilcher hit back-to-back 3s, and the Red Storm took over from there. They scored 11 straight as part of a 16-2 run, and they added to their lead after Rivera hit a 3 for DePaul with just under two minutes remaining. Ayo answered with one of his own, and Smith scored on a tip-in for St. John's with 23 seconds left.

Key stat

St. John's made nine 3-pointers, with Smith and Ayo each nailing three.

Up next

The Red Storm will try to beat UConn for the second time in a little more than two weeks when it hosts the Huskies on Sunday. DePaul has a home game against Butler on Saturday.