NEW YORK -- If St. John's was hoping to use the Big East tournament to impress the NCAA selection committee, it picked a peculiar way to do it.

The Red Storm missed its first 18 shots of the second half and went scoreless for 9:23 Wednesday night before recovering for a 64-58 first-round victory over Seton Hall.

Coach Mike Jarvis was asked if he could believe winning a game with that kind of a dry spell.

"I can believe it because it happened," Jarvis said. "Anything is possible. I think we deserved the win. We had a lot more to benefit from it."

The immediate benefit is a quarterfinal date with Notre Dame on Thursday night. After that, Jarvis wasn't saying. "We know we'll be in a postseason tournament," he said. "We just don't know where.

"If you like defense and low scoring, tonight was certainly one of the classics," Jarvis said. "We're alive and we'll be here tomorrow night. Maybe it will be like the game we had a couple of weeks ago."

St. John's (20-10) beat Notre Dame 84-81 in their only meeting on Feb. 27.

While St. John's was unable to score a point at the start of the second half, Seton Hall (12-18) wasn't much better. The Pirates, who trailed by just one point at halftime at 29-28, managed just eight points in the first 8:09 of the second half.

The Pirates led only 36-29 when Donald Emanuel scored St. John's first basket of the second half with 10:33 left in the game. After that, it was Seton Hall's turn to go dry, scoring just six points as St. John's took over.

A 14-2 Red Storm run created a 46-42 lead before baskets by Charles Manga and Darius Lane tied it for the Pirates at 46 with 4:04 to play.

Then Marcus Hatten's three-point play gave St. John's the lead again and Seton Hall never recovered.

Hatten led St. John's with 16 points and John Allen had 17 for Seton Hall.

St. John's was 8-of-32 from the field in the second half and finished 21-of-63.

It was a disappointing ending to Louis Orr's first season as Seton Hall coach, the Pirates buried by 24 turnovers.

"Turnovers killed us," Orr said.