St. John's adds Cincinnati transfer Dillon Mitchell from portal
Dillon Mitchell of the Cincinnati Bearcats against the Ohio State Buckeyes at Fifth Third Arena on October 18, 2024. Credit: Getty Images/Emilee Chinn
Defense is a trademark of Rick Pitino teams and the St. John’s coach is bringing in a player who embodies that in Cincinnati transfer Dillon Mitchell, who committed to the Red Storm on Wednesday morning.
Mitchell joins what has developed into a powerhouse recruiting class for a team that is a lock to open the 2025-26 season nationally ranked and likely will be in the Top 10.
“We are thrilled to have Dillon Mitchell join our basketball family,” Pitino wrote in a social media post. “Pound for pound, inch for inch one of the hardest working and most productive players in the nation. He brings great experience and talent to our team. Extremely pumped.”
Thus far St. John’s has brought in North Carolina transfer Ian Jackson, Arizona State transfer Joson Sanon, Stanford transfer Oziyah Sellers and Providence transfer Bryce Hopkins. The first three of those will make the Red Storm a far better shooting team and the presence of Hopkins, Mitchell and Zuby Ejiofor assures they won’t slip from the formidable rebounding and defensive team they were this past season when they went 31-5.
St. John’s also recruited Austrian shooting ace Imran Suljanovic, who will be a freshman next season.
The 6-8 Mitchell played two seasons at Texas before transferring to Cincinnati for his junior season. With the Bearcats, he averaged 9.9 points, 6.9 rebounds and 1.4 steals in 28.1 minutes.
He is a tremendous athlete who rebounds bigger than his height and can guard every position, qualities Pitino puts a high value on.
He is the third of the five prospective St. John’s commits that came in for a visit over a four-day span, April 11-14.
Sellers, a 6-5 guard, committed to the Storm last week and Jackson, a 6-4 guard, committed on Monday. Princeton transfer Xavian Lee opted for national champion Florida last week and blue chip point guard Acaden Lewis has not announced a decision.
St. John’s has seen a lot of roster turnover during this offseason.
RJ Luis Jr., the Big East Player of the Year, declared for the NBA Draft and put his name in the NCAA transfer portal. Brady Dunlap, Simeon Wilcher, Vince Iwuchukwu, Jaiden Glover and Khaman Maker also are in the transfer portal. Kadary Richmond, Deivon Smith and Aaron Scott all exhausted their eligibility.
The Storm have three empty roster spots remaining. They are likely looking for a frontcourt player after 7-1 Vince Iwuchukwu put his name into the transfer portal just hours before it closed, as well as another guard for backcourt depth. They hosted Idaho State transfer Dylan Darling on Wednesday, a guard who was named Big Sky Conference Player of the Year this season after averaging 19.8 points and 5.7 assists.
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Accolades keep coming
Pitino was voted the winner of the Lou Carnesecca Coach of the Year Award, given annually by the Metropolitan Basketball Writers Association to the top Division I coach in the area, the organization announced Wednesday. Pitino was already named National Coach of the Year by the AP and USBWA.
Three Storm players — Luis, Ejiofor and Richmond — were named to the All-Met first team. Two others, Smith and Scott, were All-Met honorable mention.
Also on the first team were Rutgers freshmen Ace Bailey and Dylan Harper, Princeton’s Lee, Seton Hall’s Isaiah Coleman and Monmouth’s Abdi Bashir Jr.
Jean Aranguren of Hofstra and C.J. Luster of Stony Brook were voted to the All-Met third team.
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.
