NEW YORK — Nadirah McKenith bounced in a black leather chair inside a conference room on the second floor of Taffner Fieldhouse, the basketball complex on St. John’s campus in Queens.
She rocked her 5-7 frame back and forth, to and fro, as if trying to burn off nervous energy while she explained why she likes playing point guard and why her team is poised for its first NCAA Tournament bid in three seasons.
“We can get out and go,” said McKenith, a graduate of University High in Newark. “Nobody can guard us when we’re in transition.”
In the conference room, McKenith is demure, a freshman with braces and a quiet disposition. A floor below on the team’s practice court, though, she is a vocal force for an ascending St. John’s squad (21-5, 9-4) that arrives in Piscataway Wednesday night ranked 18th in the nation.
Eight days ago, the Red Storm defeated then-No. 3 Notre Dame. They face a Rutgers team (15-12, 7-6) that absorbed a 31-point loss Sunday against Syracuse.
Boosted by a sterling freshman class, the Red Storm are playing the best basketball of head coach Kim Barnes Arico’s eight-year tenure. And, Barnes Arico said, much of that progress comes from McKenith.
She averages 28.1 minutes a game, second-most on the team, and catalyzes an offense that runs and guns for nearly 71 points each time out. She pitches in 7.3 points, 4.5 rebounds and 4.6 assists per game.
“She has just been dominant,” Barnes Arico said.
Few might have predicted it, though the Red Storm had the 11th-best recruiting class in the nation last year, according to ESPN’s Hoop Gurlz. Shenneika Smith, a 6-1 slasher and top-10 prospect from Brooklyn, was the prize of the five-player group. She has averaged 12 points per game during her first season with the Red Storm.
McKenith was an undersized guard overlooked by some, explained Mike Flynn, the director of the Blue Star Report, a girl’s basketball scouting service. Hoop Gurlz rated her the No. 41 point guard in her class.
Programs like St. John’s operate in the shadow of national powers like Connecticut and Rutgers. Barnes Arico can’t always bank on signing top-flight recruits each year.
So someone like McKenith, who said she also took unofficial visits to Seton Hall and Towson, is a player that “sometimes a school like St. John’s has to take a chance on,” Flynn said.
Felicia Oliver knew McKenith’s potential. She coached her for four years at University, sharpening her basketball mind while helping her cradle her physical gifts. After games last year, Oliver would call Barnes Arico with progress reports.
Oliver encouraged McKenith to command her team. Off the court, Oliver explained, she could be shy, the kind of kid who communicates best via text message. On the court, she needed to be more than that.
“Because I would tell her,” Oliver said, “at the next level, nobody wants a mute point guard.”
McKenith did her own research. She traveled to the St. John’s campus and watched her future teammates play a few times.
She saw a team that won 18 games and reached the quarterfinals of the Women’s NIT. She believed they were missing a floor general.
Not anymore.
“The season has been great so far,” McKenith said. “But we still have work to do. We just can’t let up now.”
Andy McCullough may be reached at amccullough@starledger.com