"When you're in the flow of the game, you don't look where you are on the floor," said McClinton, whose 41 percent career mark from 3-point range is fourth best all-time in the Atlantic Coast Conference.
For the record, it was from about 26 feet, well behind both the college (20 feet, 9 inches) and NBA lines (23 feet) that are on the Garden court.
Those were the last of McClinton's 20 points and they gave the Hurricanes a 10-point lead on the way to a 70-56 victory over St. John's on Saturday.
McClinton matched his season high with five 3s in only seven attempts and finished with 20 points for the Hurricanes (8-4), who finished with a 46-30 rebound advantage to win for the fourth time in five games.
"They played great today," McClinton said before listing every Miami frontcourt player. "They played so well in the post today."
Miami, which had 16 offensive rebounds, had five players with either six or seven rebounds, including McClinton with six.
"Our team has been a good rebounding team and that's something we stress," Miami coach Frank Haith said. "All our guys went after the glass and we have to have that to be a good basketball team. It's something we can build on and it has to be a mainstay with our team this year."
James Dews had seven of his nine points in a 9-0 second-half run that broke the game open. He started it with a 3 and ended it with a jumper ththe 3-pointers that extended the lead to 10, and St.
John's was never closer than seven points the rest of the game.
"That 11-2 run was key to give us momentum into halftime and then we came out and didn't play well the first four minutes of the second half," Haith said, "and that's something we have to fix."
Paris Horne added 13 points for the Red Storm, despite missing 10 minutes in the second half because of a stomach cramp.
The Hurricanes, who were 17th in the preseason Top 25 and ranked for the first three weeks of the regular season, have lost all their games this season to ranked teams: Connecticut, Ohio State and Clemson.
