St. John's communication key to defending the three
St. John's Red Storm guard Kadary Richmond, center Vince Iwuchukwu and guard Deivon Smith react against the DePaul Blue Demons in the second half of a Big East men’s basketball game at Carnesecca Arena on Tuesday, Dec. 17, 2024. Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Silence may be golden — but not when you’re playing defense.
St. John’s went into Friday night’s Big East road matchup against Providence at Amica Pavilion having lost just two of 11 games by a total of four points. Its failure to defend the three-point line played a crucial part in both defeats. This week, however, the Red Storm may have started to turn the tide on that.
In the opener of its three-game trip to the Bahamas, Baylor defeated the Red Storm, 99-98, in double overtime on Jeremy Roach’s three-pointer at the buzzer. It was controversial because a clock issue gave the Bears a tick of extra time to get the winning shot off, but it was their 15th three-pointer as they shot 52% from distance. The Storm lost by three to Georgia in the final game on the trip as the Bulldogs made 42% of their three-point attempts.
As recently as Monday, Rick Pitino called defending the three-point shot “one of the major weaknesses of our basketball team” and he blamed it on poor communication like calling out the screens that are coming and the defensive switches they need to make.
“To be a great defensive team, you must verbally communicate,” Pitino said. “And we have people who are very quiet. . . It's very difficult to get people to change their personalities between the lines — we work on it every single day.
“Away from the lines, you can be quiet, you can be introverted. But between the lines, you have to talk.”
The Red Storm now seems to have picked up the beat. Their Big East opener on Tuesday night was against a DePaul team that relied heavily on three-point shots and was making 12.8 threes on 31.7 attempts per game. St. John’s held the Blue Demons to 6-for-20 (30%) from beyond the arc and DePaul's only three-pointer in the second half came with 42 seconds remaining.
“We made a huge jump,” Deivon Smith said. “It’s been a strong plea from coach: stopping the three ball [and] picking [shooters] up.”
“We were preparing as if it was the last game of the season and we had to win it because of the way they shoot the ball, but our defense was absolutely brilliant,” Pitino said after Tuesday's victory. “Prior to the last [minute] of the game, they didn't have a [second-half] three. Their attempts were way down. That's when you know you're playing great defense, when the attempts are way down.”
Now that the Big East schedule is in full swing, a repeat effort like that is going to be essential for the Red Storm. Four teams — Xavier, Villanova, DePaul and Butler — entered Friday shooting 39% or better from beyond the arc.
“That's something that we're going to have to work on, just defending three-point shots,” Zuby Ejiofor said, “and limiting [teams] to as few three-pointers as possible.”
Pitino said that last season's team struggled with the same issue but the situation improved and coincided with their strong finish.
“If they want to win, they’ll figure it out,” Pitino said. “That's the thing: if you want to be a great defensive team, you have to talk.”
No more handshakes
In a move that could leave St. John’s potentially open to criticism, Pitino announced that the Red Storm will no longer participate in postgame handshake lines with the other team. He announced the decision on Thursday morning in a social media post.
“I certainly have great respect for the coaches and teams we play but after witnessing multiple problems with the postgame handshake line, we will take a page out of the NBA playbook and refrain,” the dispatch read.
Pitino made no reference to a particular game. However it appeared that one member of the Storm coaching staff had friction with a member of DePaul’s coaching staff in the handshake line after Tuesday’s win at Carnesecca Arena.
Advocating for Donovan
When St. John’s visited Providence last season, Pitino made a plea in a news conference that the school retire the uniform number of Billy Donovan, the Rockville Centre native who starred for the Friars when Pitino coached them to the 1987 Final Four. Not long afterward, the school made an announcement it would do just that and ceremony will be in mid-February, timed around Donovan’s Chicago Bulls playing the Boston Celtics.
On Friday, Pitino was at it again. Donovan was announced as a candidate for the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame on Thursday as a coach and Pitino, already a member, voiced public support for his induction.
“There are eight coaches to win back to back NCAA championships, and one of them, Billy 'the Kid' Donovan, was just nominated for the Naismith Hall of Fame,” Pitino said in a social media post. “No one in coaching could be more deserving!”
As a college coach, Donovan went 502-207 and led Florida to consecutive national championships in 2006 and 2007.
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.
