NEW YORK — It was the biggest game of his career and Dylan Darling was having a terrible night. With three seconds to play in St. John’s NCAA Tournament second-round game versus Kansas, the junior guard was 0 for 4 from the field. He had played serviceable defense, but was otherwise a non-factor. The score was tied at 65.
In the huddle, Darling asked for the ball. Six months earlier, Pitino wouldn’t have obliged. But in March, he knew Darling understood the stakes, the culture. He had been mentored by senior leader Zuby Ejiofor and rebuilt in the St. John’s system. If the Johnnies wanted to win, Darling needed the basketball. Sure enough, his driving layup earned St. John’s a spot in the Sweet Sixteen.
“I’m real proud of him because to want the ball when you haven’t made a shot is unbelievable,” said Pitino.
The win was emblematic of Pitino’s coaching philosophy. Darling had the clutch gene — Pitino knew it when he pursued him in the transfer portal — but for much of the season he was reckless. The Big Sky Player of the Year was too aware of his misses, too ready to recede to save a box score.
“You got more excuses and more signs of weakness than anybody I’ve coached,” Pitino told him in January.
Over conference play, Darling improved. He adopted St. John’s work ethic, Pitino’s scrappiness. He spent time working with NBA-bound Ejiofor. Darling learned to keep shooting threes when they wouldn’t drop.
When his crunch-time trey gave the Johnnies a win over Xavier, Pitino bestowed on him a new moniker: “Big Bells” for his “balls the size of church bells.”
And then, Darling entered the transfer portal.
Darling’s departure was perhaps the most surprising part of a gutting off-season for St. John’s. Pitino lost Ejiofor, Bryce Hopkins and Dillon Mitchell to the NBA Draft, Oziyah Sellers to eligibility and five more scholarship players — including Darling — to the portal. The decisions of Ian Jackson and Ruben Prey were reassuring, but the rest of the team was gone. The culture Pitino was so keen on imparting had dissipated in the transfer portal.
He was faced with a choice: Recruit young and focus on development or re-tune his strategy in the off-season. Pitino was candid at Big East Media Day as to why he pursued the strategy he did. “I have a great sense of urgency because I’m 74,” he told Hoops HQ.
In an atypical offseason, Pitino added six European pros and three of the highest paid transfers in college basketball: sophomore wing Tounde Yessofou (Baylor) and power forwards Keyshawn Hall (Auburn) and Donnie Freeman (Syracuse).
Jackson, a junior who transferred from North Carolina a year ago, was voted preseason All Big East, and Yessofou is poised for a huge season. But Freeman is already lost for the season due to a ruptured Achilles tendon he suffered over the summer, and Hall’s eligibility is not assured because his case is still winding through the courts.
“It’s as good a backcourt as there is in the nation,” Pitino said. “What I love most about the way (Jackson) is playing is he’s unguardable going to the basket. Unguardable. Him and Keyshawn Hall have been unguardable. Anybody who tries to check him on the perimeter, he just speeds by it.”
Still, cohesion has been hard to come by amid eligibility headaches. At Big East Media Day, Pitino detailed a quagmire of visa issues, academic ineligibility and complications of the new 5-in-5 rule.
“We had a bad summer because of injuries, visa problems, and we’re trying to catch up right now,” said Pitino. “We feel everyone’s going to be fine. Everybody’s going to be playing.”
Last week, Hall received a temporary restraining order from the Queens Supreme Court. On Tuesday, he’ll appear alongside prospective teammate Babacar Sane to confirm their eligibility for the oncoming season. Quinn Ellis and Reed Bailey are also still awaiting clearance to play.
The result is talent without connective tissue — the same mode of bad basketball it took Darling months to unlearn. Last year, Pitino’s solution was senior leadership from Ejiofor.
“This is definitely the most talent [I’ve had] at St. John’s,” said Pitino, “but there’s no Zuby Ejiofor, and that’s the X factor.”
In other words, a disjointed superteam with an imperative: Find a leader and win now. A third-straight 30-win season for the Johnnies isn’t enough. After an unproductive offseason, they’ll have just a few months to internalize Pitino’s philosophy and mesh into a championship-caliber team.
“We had a terrible summer,” admitted Pitino. “Look, every coach tries to build their culture. It’s difficult because we have six Europeans, four players from different countries in Africa, and to establish a culture takes time. There’s nothing I can do to speed up the process except to take them through it offensively and defensively.
“We’ve got 10 new players. They are adjusting to each other, they’re adjusting to the coaches. We’re adjusting to them. Great group of guys. Working their tails off, but they’re all new to each other.”
While other squads brought starting lineups to Media Day, Pitino brought only Jackson. The offseason cost St. John’s over $10 million in NIL packages and recruiting trips, but Pitino’s new go-to guy never left Queens.
“Ian’s going to be one of the premier players in the country,” said Pitino. “He is having a great fall. He’s consistently been great.”
Pitino is making Jackson in the mold of team leaders past: Ejiofor, Jamal Mashburn and Cavaliers star Donovan Mitchell, who Pitino coached at Louisville. Per Pitino, Mitchell has spent the summer mentoring Jackson.
“Hanging around Donovan Mitchell is a positive influence because Donovan is not only a great worker, great player, but a great person,” Pitino said. “Ian’s very similar: he’s a worker, he’s a great person, he’s a terrific leader, he’s having a great fall, he’s playing terrific, he’s unguardable right now. Nobody can check him.”
The implication is that Mitchell will take up the mantle from Ejiofor. On a team of international pros and transfers, Pitino needs a conduit for his philosophy: an “X Factor” to build a team from a roster. Jackson is already hard at work.
“I still got to learn, so we just feed off each other, teach each other, and keep building that bond. I’m close with all of (my teammates).” Jackson told Hoops HQ. “Quinn is super close with me. I’m cool with Keyshawn, Baba, Reed (Bailey), everybody. We all getting trying to get there.”
To excel, Pitino and Jackson must align on philosophy. Jackson must mature. His means of on-court leadership must be tested like Ejiofor’s and Mitchell’s before him.
For the Johnnies to win a championship, Jackson will have to exceed Ejiofor, which will be challenging given the less experienced lineup around him. “Having a true leader and someone that understands what it takes to win at a high level — being able to exude that and give that to everybody else is huge for a team,” Jackson said. “I’m immediately leaning into that. I’m not trying to implement exactly what (Ejiofor) did but I want to be a leader in the same way he did.”
