When No. 7 St. John’s beat Butler on Wednesday night time, the Purple Storm clinched no less than a share of the Massive East title for the primary time since 1992.
Cue Rick Pitino: “We’re not all for sharing something.”
St. John’s is getting the total Pitino expertise: an unmistakable persona, some eye-catching quotes for higher or worse, and a complete lot of successful.
Possibly all of us ought to have seen this coming. You can also make the argument that no trendy coach does a greater job of instilling his ethos into a brand new program and getting near-immediate outcomes.
All of his groups, from Windfall to Kentucky to Louisville and even Iona, made a dramatic soar between 12 months 1 and 12 months 2, as documented right here by faculty basketball mensch Trilly Donovan. At St. John’s, Pitino’s first season ended with a 20-13 file and an NCAA Match snub—not the worst place to start out.
Now the Purple Storm are 25-4 and a practical candidate for the Ultimate 4.
Suppose again to Feb. 18, 2024, when St. John’s blew a 19-point lead at residence to lose to Seton Corridor. Pitino laid into his gamers postgame.
“We’re so nonathletic that we are able to’t guard anyone with out fouling,” Pitino stated, earlier than naming 5 of his gamers and calling them “sluggish laterally” or “bodily weak.”
It felt brutal on the time. You do this behind closed doorways, not on the microphone, some declared (I’ll have been amongst them). However the wiser amongst us may acknowledge a motivational tactic after they noticed one.
Since that day, St. John’s has gone a ridiculous 31-5. Discuss a turning level.
Granted, this yr’s group is way totally different than final yr’s. Such is life within the switch portal period. However Pitino has confirmed well-equipped for that. At Massive East media day, he didn’t hesitate to talk about the cash being on the desk now as a substitute of underneath it.
Nevertheless you are feeling about his previous or his persona, this can be a man who is aware of find out how to entice expertise. After which he squeezes out their full potential.
This season, he pieced collectively an all-transfer backcourt of Kadary Richmond, Deivon Smith and Aaron Scott whereas build up Zuby Ejiofor into an actual menace on the block (from 4.3 factors and three.1 rebounds per sport final yr to 14.0 ppg and eight.1 rpg now). Then there’s captain RJ Luis Jr. on the wing, the main scorer who does somewhat of all the pieces nicely.
VICE cameras capturing a documentary sequence captured Pitino giving his gamers a fiery halftime speech earlier this season after they have been dropping to Windfall. Free from digs about bodily weak spot and lateral slowness, it was a message about studying find out how to deal with adversity as a substitute of wilting within the face of it. St. John’s held Windfall to twenty-eight factors within the second half of that sport and received 72-70 on Ejiofor’s last-second shot.
His gamers have been fired up, however Pitino’s son Richard, the coach at New Mexico, had a unique response. “PTSD of the time I didn’t make my mattress,” he wrote on X.
Like father, like son. They’ll preserve the quips coming, and the wins to again them up.
