For the second straight game, DePaul trailed by double digits late but mounted a furious game-changing comeback. And for the second straight game, they came up just short.

The Demons lost 71-62 to St. John’s Saturday afternoon, their third-straight loss and their fifth loss in six games. Jamee Crockett had a season-best 19 points, but St. John’s took the lead early in the second half and did just enough to escape from Allstate Arena with a victory.

Though the Red Storm led by only two at the half, a 10-0 push gave them a 47-39 lead. It kick-started a larger 26-7 run that gave them their largest lead, 63-46, with 7:36 remaining.

“We gave up a number of offensive rebounds on free throw block-outs,” head coach Oliver Purnell said. “We turned the ball over at the top in situations that led to easy baskets for St. John’s.”

In the 10-0 stretch, St. John’s got four fastbreak layups, and during the course of taking a 17-point lead, the Red Storm fearlessly took the ball to the rim, with driving layups from D’Angelo Harrison, JaKarr Sampson and Jamal Branch. The Demons turned the ball over 18 times, leading to 24 points off turnovers for St. John’s.

“We just were careless with the ball,” Crockett said. “We weren’t executing our offense, and we weren’t guarding them like we were guarding them in the first half.”

But DePaul worked their way back. The team got a dunk from Cleveland Melvin, five free throws from Melvin and Crockett and three three-pointers from Crockett and Moses Morgan to make the score 65-62 with 2:24 left.

“DePaul continues to fight and scratch and claw,” St. John’s coach Steve Lavin said. “They’re going to go on runs.”

The run ended though, and the Demons went scoreless the rest of the game. The Red Storm sank their free throws (six from Harrison) and the Demons went back to bricking shots from deep. DePaul went 0-4 from three-point range with under two minutes left, and shot only 20 percent (5-of-25) for the game.

“I thought we took far too many of them, and obviously we didn’t hit enough,” Purnell said. “We needed to go inside more and get fouled, because we didn’t get to the line nearly enough.”

Crockett’s fine outing went for naught. In addition to two clutch threes in DePaul’s comeback effort, he also threw down a few powerful dunks. In the first half, Donnavan Kirk missed a three-pointer that hit back iron, but Crockett read the carom, flew across the lane and stuffed down the miss one-handed. Crockett also recorded four rebounds, four steals and three assists before fouling out with a minute left.

In the games leading up to Saturday, Crockett had only scored eight in Connecticut and two versus Cincinnati.

“It was good to see Jamee Crockett break out of a little bit of a funk,” Purnell said. “A good effort, he made some shots for us. Got to the rim, attacked the rim. So that was good to see.”

Melvin scored 16 points on the afternoon with eight rebounds. Morgan finished with nine points on three three-pointers. Brandon Young scored 10 points and got 10 rebounds, but shot only 2-of-11 (including an airballed three-pointer down five with 1:10 left) and turned the ball over seven times. The Red Storm double- and triple-teamed Melvin, and their defense held DePaul to 34 percent shooting.

As for St. John’s, top scorer Harrison (at 19.8 points per game) scored 15 with eight rebounds. Sir’Dominic Pointer had 14 points and 11 boards. Branch was the high scorer with 18 points. Branch was able to get to the rim almost any time he wanted, and his mid-range jumper was accurate (9-of-14 shooting).

DePaul’s next game is in Pittsburgh a week from Saturday (Jan. 26), and then they travel to New York to take on St. John’s once more, Jan. 30.

“[We’ll] just try to get them at the next one,” Crockett said, upset at the loss. “We’re getting them again in two weeks.”