St. John's knows it needs to get off to better start in second season under Rick Pitino
St. John's Red Storm head coach Rick Pitino reacts in the second half against the Towson Tigers at Carnesecca Arena on Oct. 26 in Queens. Credit: Corey Sipkin
Approximately a dozen new players arrived at St. John’s to play for coach Rick Pitino in his debut season with the Red Storm last year. There were lessons aplenty in how the Hall of Fame coach wanted them to train, think and play. But the hardest and most important lesson came on the final day of their season.
That was Selection Sunday, when St. John’s wasn’t chosen to be in the NCAA Tournament.
It didn’t matter that the Red Storm had won six of their last seven games — the only defeat a five-point loss to eventual repeat national champion Connecticut in St. John’s first Big East semifinal since 2000. St. John’s may have been excellent at the end, but it was not good in the early going, dropping games to substandard Michigan and Boston College. Those reflected badly on the Red Storm as the selection committee assessed their entire body of work for the season.
The lesson: Every game — every game! — has weight.
The first sign of just how well that lesson was learned comes Monday at Carnesecca Arena when St. John’s hosts Fordham at 6:30 p.m. in its season opener.
“There’s a lot of things we could have done early to increase our chances of going to the tournament,” Zuby Ejiofor said. “Our job is not to repeat those mistakes . . . taking care of business like we’re supposed to early on and not give the committee any choice but to put us in the tournament.”
Asked about the Michigan and Boston College losses, Brady Dunlap said, “They killed us at the end. We didn’t realize how important they’d be. You don’t make that mistake twice.”
Certainly, the opener looks like a mismatch. The Red Storm, who went 20-13 last season, were voted fifth in the preseason coaches’ poll in a very deep Big East. They feature four key returnees — Ejiofor, Dunlap, RJ Luis Jr. and Simeon Wilcher — and a top-five transfer class led by Kadary Richmond from Seton Hall. Fordham went 13-20 last season and was tabbed to finish 14th of 15 in the Atlantic 10.
Pitino and his staff have given the Red Storm more opportunities to begin making their NCAA Tournament case with a far tougher non-conference schedule. They will face a 2024 NCAA Tournament team in New Mexico (coached by Pitino’s son Richard) on Nov. 17 at the Garden before playing three critical games against high majors — No. 5 Baylor, either No. 12 Tennessee or Virginia in a tournament and then Georgia — in four days at the end of the month in the Bahamas.
“We’re going to be much better at the beginning of this season and I’m hoping we’re as good as last season’s team at the end,” Pitino said. “The players that are back have developed and gotten better. And we’ve become quicker, more athletic and bigger [via transfers].”
In Big East play, St. John’s had some excruciating near-wins: a four-point loss to UConn in Hartford, a one-point loss at Creighton, a one-point home loss to Marquette and a three-point loss at Providence. So closing out games also has become a priority this season.
“There’s a lot of games that did come down to one possession and this year we’re working on . . . lessening that margin of error and being able to do things correctly down the stretch,” Ejiofor said. “We’ll need those games to get to the tournament.”
St. John’s last made the NCAA Tournament in 2019 when it squeaked into the First Four. But it hasn’t been in the main draw since 2015 and hasn’t won a tournament game since 2000. Pitino and the players know there is an anticipation that all these streaks can end in 2024-25.
“There’s a lot of hype around this [team] and everybody is excited — us included — to see what we can do this season because we feel like we could go pretty much as high as we [want],” Ejiofor said. “We feel like it’s going to be an exciting year.”
Roger Rubin returned to Newsday in 2018 to write about high schools, colleges and baseball following 20 years at the Daily News. A Baseball Hall of Fame voter since 2011, he has covered 13 MLB postseasons and 14 NCAA Final Fours.