St. John’s beat Creighton 79-73 on Sunday to widen the gap between it and the program that has been its biggest threat to winning the Big East for the first time in 33 years. As a result, the Red Storm now have a two-game lead in the league standings with just five contests remaining in the regular season, meaning it’s suddenly more likely that they’ll secure an outright conference championship for the first time since 1985 than it is that they won’t get at least a share of it for the first time since 1992.
In other words, this is happening.
Yes, Rick Pitino is really doing it — and by “doing it” I mean snapping streaks and positioning a once-proud program to take a realistic shot at a run to the Final Four next month in only his second year guiding the Johnnies. It’s the type of stuff that has Pitino a serious part of any sensible National Coach of the Year conversation as his Red Storm are 22-4 overall, 13-2 in the Big East and No. 11 in Monday morning’s updated CBS Sports Top 25 And 1 daily college basketball rankings after getting 23 points and 14 rebounds from RJ Luis Jr. in Sunday’s victory that drew another sold-out crowd to Madison Square Garden.
“The only thing I’m really surprised about is the fan base packing The Garden,” Pitino said. “These are now Knicks crowds.”
Indeed, they are. It’s been fun to watch.
Next up for St. John’s is Wednesday’s game at DePaul. After that, it’s Sunday’s rematch at home with UConn. After that, it’s a road game with Butler (Feb. 26), a home game with Seton Hall (March 1) and the regular-season finale at Marquette (March 8). At this point, St. John’s could lose any two of those games and still win at least a share of a Big East championship.
So, again, this is happening.
There’s never just one great story in college basketball, if only because the sport is too grand for that. So I won’t insist that what Pitino is doing at St. John’s is undeniably our best story because what Bruce Pearl is doing at Auburn is obviously also great — not to mention what Jon Scheyer is doing at Duke and what Kelvin Sampson is doing at Houston. There are great stories all over the place. But you cannot tell the story of the 2024-25 college basketball season to date without spending a little time on New York City’s top program.
The Red Storm are very good again and Rick Pitino is responsible. As you likely know, no coach has ever taken four different schools to the Final Four. But, as you likely also know, Pitino has already done it with Providence, Kentucky and Louisville — and he appears to have a team good enough right now to also do it with St. John’s.
