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After Wesley Jenkins hit an elbow jump shot to put St. Peter's up 51-50 with the few remaining seconds left, the Pirates ran their desperation play. Jeremy Hazell inbounded to Herb Pope, who found Harvey on the left sideline just prior to halfcourt.

Harvey took off from about 30 feet out, double clutched and let it go with one hand. Then the entire arena watched in momentary silence as it sailed in as the buzzer went off to give the Pirates a 53-51 win.

Another crisis averted, thanks to a bit of plagiarism from coach Bobby Gonzalez.

Looking for the right inbounds play to throw into his repertoire for the left side of the court, Gonzalez decided to use the same play Scottie Reynolds and Villanova ran to perfection to beat Pittsburgh in last year's Elite Eight.

And even though Harvey, who finished with a game-high 16 points after not starting for the first time in his collegiate career, had never even seen the original version, it still ended in a similar fashion. Although Harvey's personal touch gave Gonzalez some agita.

"That play that we ran we run it all the time in practice. It's basically the Villanova play, the play that they ran with Scottie Reynolds when they beat Pittsburgh," said Gonzalez. "Obviously I did not want Eugene [Harvey] to pull up and jump in the air from behind the three-point line. There was two seconds left. I wanted him to try it get close to the basket as he could. And we got a little lucky. He made an incredible shot."

How a loss would have added on to the week's earlier transgressions is one problem Gonzalez does not have to worry about. But there is still the issue of what happened early Monday morning and the ensuing fallout.

If there was any attempt by Keon Lawrence or the Seton Hall program to quietly move on from his early crash, arrest and subsequent suspension it wasn't apparent during Friday night's season opener.

Lawrence was easily visible on the Pirates' bench, dressed in an all-white suit with a bandage over his chin. And when the Prudential Center crowd chanted "We want Keon" just moments into the game, he acknowledged them with a smile and a wave.

Gonzalez never wavered on keeping Lawrence with the team, saying that although he will not play or practice, he will be a part of the squad.

"There was never any thought on my part about keeping him away from the team. He's still a part of our family," said Gonzalez. "I still love the kid, even though I am disgusted with the judgment that he made."

And as for being so conspicuous with his sartorial decision, Gonzalez had little to say about that, "What he decided to wear is what he owns as clothes."

Playing without Lawrence, brought in as an offensive sparkplug, Seton Hall struggled offensively and couldn't find a rhythm.

"We haven't been able to get in sync," said Gonzalez. "We haven't been able to play as one group for very long. We've had different situations going on. Obviously another situation going on with a young man that's no longer playing right now. We're trying to fit Jeff [Robinson] in because we think he'll be a very important guy but he doesn't play until December. It's going to take us a little while."

Herb Pope was one of the new faces trying to blend in, after sitting out as a transfer. He finished with six points, seven rebounds, six assists and four blocks, but was "passive" in his own mind because he tried to show his new teammates that he could fit in. Jeremy Hazell, the Big East's second leading scorer last season, struggled mightily, scoring only two points and missing all 10 of his field goal attempts as he tried to curb his play to make room for the new talent.

All in all, considering all that went wrong, with a leading scorer who almost went scoreless, 17 turnovers and their lowest point total in over three years, John Garcia couldn't have imagined a win if you told him how it would play out before the game.

"No chance," said the center, who finished with 10 points, nine rebounds and three blocks. "There is no chance we win the game that way. Because that's not the style of play we wanna play. I just never envisioned it. That's probably the only way we would be able to win a game, with those kind of circumstances, with a game winning shot."

Maybe he should have taken a hint that it was a different kind of night when Robert "Stix" Mitchell took a three-pointer that went halfway in before coming out, and finally resting on the rim before a jump ball was called. And considering it was also Friday the 13th, Garcia saw the win as anything but a normal way to start the season.

"It was Herb's first game in about a year. Certain things that never happened, ever. Some anomalies," said Garcia, incredulously. "Like Jeremy [Hazell] scored two points. That's never happened. I've never seen that in my life. Two of our leading scorers just didn't play well. I don't know. Shots weren't going down for us and it was weird. It was just a strange game. So many strange things were happening. Stix shooting that three-pointer and having it stay that way. It was just destiny for the game to end that way."