Rick Pitino positive has the life. He continues to be profitable large 13 years after his induction into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame and, higher but, he’s nonetheless dwelling beside the third inexperienced at Winged Foot Golf Club.
He referred to as his yard view of the iconic course a suburban New York treasure. “I never want to give that up,” Pitino mentioned.
Another factor he by no means desires to half with: his job. At 73 years outdated and a grandfather to 16, Pitino is just not working away from the NIL, play-for-pay realities of school basketball. He dearly loves the sport (“I eat, sleep, and drink it.”) and needs to maintain going and going, perhaps till his eightieth birthday, God keen, in fact.
Three years right into a six-year contract, St. John’s desires Pitino to settle for a profitable new deal to maintain him subsequent door to Winged Foot. “They have offered me one, but I haven’t signed it yet,” Pitino mentioned. “I think it’s on the table right now and in the works but … I’m just focused on winning this tournament.”
The Big East Tournament. St. John’s gained it final 12 months, Pitino’s second season at the college, for the first time in 1 / 4 century. The Red Storm completed 2025 ranked fifth in the nation — earlier than falling to Arkansas of their second NCAA Tournament sport — and began this season at No. 5 once more, the finest preseason rating in program historical past.
Early struggles tempered expectations earlier than St. John’s gained 16 of its last 17 video games and repeated as regular-season champs for the first time in 4 many years. Everything revolves round large man Zuby Ejiofor, the college’s first star to win the convention’s Player of the Year and Defensive Player of the Year in the similar season. The Red Storm begin the Big East Tournament on Thursday in opposition to Providence. It’s a workforce with a reliable likelihood to attain the Final Four for the first time since Lou Carnesecca and Chris Mullin bought there in 1985.
If St. John’s does advance to Indianapolis in April, Pitino could be main his fourth college to a Final Four (Providence, Kentucky and Louisville) and training in the national semis in a fifth completely different decade (beginning with Providence in 1987). He doesn’t assume this 2026 workforce is as gifted as the 2025 workforce that was upset in the event, however then once more, these Red Storm should not missing in poise and coronary heart.
“Can we win the national championship?” Pitino mentioned. “I’m not sure our backcourt is strong enough for that. But the way (point guard) Dylan Darling is playing, everything is possible.”
It could be a hell of a factor if the basketball lifer who grew up in Manhattan, Queens, and Long Island, who signed his UMass scholarship papers on the flooring of Madison Square Garden, and who as soon as coached the New York Knicks into the playoffs completed his profession by profitable St. John’s’ first NCAA title. In a metropolis of championship droughts — the Jets haven’t gained since the 1968 season, the Knicks since 1973, the Mets since 1986, and so forth. — St. John’s final reached an NCAA last in 1952, six months earlier than Pitino was born.
A ticker-tape parade in his hometown in some unspecified time in the future earlier than he lastly retires? Pitino mentioned that he hasn’t given it a lot thought, that his philosophy on basketball as he’s gotten older aligns with the late Jim Valvano’s method to March.
Survive and advance … from at some point to the subsequent.
But if the solely coach to win national titles at a number of faculties have been to win The Big One at a 3rd in St. John’s?
“I really don’t think in terms of winning a national championship,” Pitino mentioned. “I think in terms of building up a team to have a shot to win the national championship.
“But it’s the place I grew up in, the place I love, so it would mean everything as a New Yorker. It would be one of the great endings for any person, never mind me. … It would be an amazing feat.”
Yankees supervisor Aaron Boone, left, and Rick Pitino swap jerseys throughout the Yankees’ playoff run. (Jim McIsaac / Getty Images)
So would 1,000 profession Division I victories, relying on how you retain rating. Pitino owns 910 on-court victories, regardless that the NCAA places his official whole at 787. Infractions dedicated on his watch at Louisville compelled the NCAA to vacate his 2013 national crown and, finally, price Pitino his job. Those unforced errors are there for individuals to choose how they see match.
Pitino mentioned the completely different errors made with Louisville, and years earlier with the Boston Celtics, modified him over the long run. “I’m a much better coach and person because of failure,” he mentioned. After Louisville, he discovered a sanctuary with the Panathinaikos membership in Greece, the place, Pitino mentioned, “I didn’t know one person and I was coaching in countries I’d never seen before. That made me stronger and better, too.”
He landed again in the States at mid-major Iona after which at St. John’s, a barely-relevant program that Pitino described as “a mess” upon his arrival. Nobody who has watched Pitino coach is stunned that three years later, St. John’s is the reverse of that.
Pitino can’t see himself teaching at one more college, although he mentioned his time in Greece and the EuroLeague was so particular {that a} return there “would be a possibility if I’m being totally honest.”
And as quickly as he mentioned these phrases, Pitino stopped himself chilly and contemplated these Winged Foot views. “I don’t feel like moving again,” he mentioned via amusing.
At St. John’s, he will get to problem himself in several methods by competing in opposition to his son Richard at Xavier and in opposition to Dan Hurley at UConn, winner of two of the final three national titles. Nothing is straightforward in faculty basketball at a time when Pitino believes the sport is as aggressive on the flooring as he’s ever seen it.
Now comes the arduous half, inside March Madness, a spot the place you want guards to make performs and everybody to make foul pictures to have a shot at the ring.
“It can definitely be done at St. John’s,” Pitino mentioned.
“You just have to be a little lucky along the way.”
