St. John's returns to the AP Top 25 national rankings
St. John's head coach Rick Pitino directs his players during men’s basketball practice at Madison Square Garden on Monday, Jan. 20, 2025. Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
On Saturday night, St. John’s climbed into first place in the Big East standings. On Monday afternoon, the Red Storm ascended back into the national rankings.
St. John’s (16-3, 7-1) came in at No. 20 in the Associated Press poll released Monday, receiving 320 points based on the 62 votes cast. It’s the highest ranking for the program since the 2014-15 season.
“It’s a testament to the amount of work that we put in this whole season,” Zuby Ejiofor said.
“We’ve been playing collective basketball as of late and now we’re ranked, and the nation now knows St. John’s basketball. So we’ll just look to keep it going.”
“It’s super-exciting — our work is paying off,” Deivon Smith said. “We want to knock the number] down because we’re at 20 and we have some teams in front of us in our conference. We’re still chasing goals, still want to win our conference and beat those teams in front of us.”
St. John’s held a workout at Madison Square Garden after Monday afternoon’s Knicks-Hawks game as part of its preparation for Wednesday night’s contest against Xavier, a game that coach Rick Pitino is calling “the biggest game of the year for us and the biggest game of the year for them.”
But the news on Monday wasn’t all good. Smith, who missed last Tuesday’s game against Georgetown because of a right shoulder sprain, talked his way into playing on Saturday against Seton Hall and appeared hampered by the injury. Pitino said it’s put him in doubt for the game against the Musketeers.
“’I’m in some pain right now, pretty banged up,” Smith said. “But I just want to get to 100% so I could [give] my best effort out there and continue to win games with the guys.”
Smith thinks he might have been a target of physical play by the Pirates.
“Everybody knows my arm is messed up, so a lot of people are just going at it, following me, pulling my arm and stuff like that,” he said. “There’s still a little pain and discomfort. So that’s probably the bad part.”
Said Pitino, “He’s really not healed yet, but we’re hoping. We’re going to take it slow. I don’t know if he’ll play in the Xavier game or not, but he didn’t look good today at this morning’s practice. He’s just not ready to come back yet.
“He wanted to play [Saturday],” Pitino added. “It was up to him, not me. This time around, I’ll make the decision.”
St. John’s took over first place in the Big East with last Tuesday’s five-point win over Georgetown at the Garden and Saturday’s 79-51 victory over Seton Hall at Prudential Center.
St. John’s was ranked No. 22 for two weeks in November, it’s first appearance in the Top 25 since a one-week stay in 2019. It fell out of the national rankings after losing two of three games played in the Bahamas, to Baylor in double overtime and to Georgia.
St. John’s is one of three Big East teams now in the Top 25, along with No. 10 Marquette, which fell from No. 7 after a loss to Xavier last week in Milwaukee, and No. 19 Connecticut, which slipped from No. 14 after losing to visiting Creighton.
St. John’s is No. 25 in the NCAA’s NET rankings, one of the factors used by the NCAA Tournament selection committee.
Pitino said the Red Storm’s return to the national rankings doesn’t really excite him, “but for the fans, I know how important it is for them. So I’m very appreciative of that.”
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.
