Friday, November 20th, 7:00 p.m. (et).

FACTS & STATS: Site: Carnesecca Arena (5,602) -- Queens, New York. Television: None. Home Record: Brown 0-1, St. John's 1-0. Away Record: Brown 1-1, St. John's 1-0. Neutral Record: Brown 0-0, St. John's 0-0. Conference Record: Brown 0-0, St. John's 0-0. Series Record: St. John's leads, 1-0.

GAME NOTES: The St. John's Red Storm gun for their third win in as many tries to start the 2009-10 season tonight, as they host the Brown Bears as part of the Philly Hoop Group Classic at Carnesecca Arena in Queens.

Like every other Big East Conference team as of Wednesday, the Red Storm have yet to lose a game this season, having beaten Long Island University in the home opener by an 83-70 score last Saturday and then followed that up with a narrow 69-68 decision over St. Bonaventure on the road three days later.

As for the Bears, this is already their fourth game of the season, their second in the last three nights. Wednesday saw the squad suffer a 78-57 loss to Rhode Island at home, marking the team's second straight setback following a 69-55 defeat at Virginia Tech last Sunday.

The only previous meeting between these two schools was back in 1976 as part of the Lapchick Tournament, named after former St. John's head coach Joe Lapchick. Also the season opener for the program that year, St. John's captured a 79-65 win at what was then Alumni Hall.

Both of these two teams will be back in action a week from today as part of the championship round for this event at The Palestra in Philadelphia, with Brown taking on Siena and the Red Storm squaring off against Temple.

Against URI earlier this week, the Bears shot just 36.4 percent from the field in the first half and never recovered, making a mere 35.8 percent for the game and 5-of-21 behind the three-point line. Brown also turned the ball over 22 times as Peter Sullivan tried to keep the squad close with his team-best 15 points, followed by Matt Mullery with 10 points and a team-best 11 rebounds. A starter in all three games to this point, Mullery leads the group in scoring with his 13.0 ppg, thanks to 63 percent shooting from the field and not his 57.1 percent accuracy at the free-throw line. Peter Sullivan checks in as the only other double-digit scorer for the group with his 10.3 ppg, but in his case his miserable 30.3 percent effort form the field and 26.7 percent behind the three-point line are numbers that he and the Bears simply cannot live with if Brown is going to be successful in 2009-10.

Ahead by as many as eight points in the second half, the Red Storm nearly let one slip away against the Bonnies in the last outing, needing a pair of free throws by Malik Boothe with six seconds to play to bring them back from a one- point deficit and onto the one-point win. Boothe finished with only four points in the contest, instead leaving the bulk of the scoring responsibility to D.J. Kennedy and Paris Horne who dropped in 18 and 15 points, respectively. Between the duo there were six three-point baskets on 11 tries. One area St. John's should be concerned about is on the glass where the team tallied just 20 boards versus St. Bonaventure. The Red Storm handled LIU in the paint well enough, but the team won't be able to get away with that sort of play once the Big East Conference slate kicks into gear. After two games, Kennedy leads the team with 17.0 ppg, shooting better out on the perimeter (.583) than he is the floor overall (.526).

Maybe against the Ivy League the Bears are a real challenge, but on the road in a small building like this chances are Brown is going to be overmatched.

Predicted Outcome

St. John's 72, Brown 64