LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) — In men’s college basketball, this has been The Year of the Southeastern Conference.
Five SEC teams have consistently been ranked in the top 10. NCAA Tournament forecasts have as many as 13 SEC programs in the 68-team field.
It’s also been The Year of Cooper Flagg, the precociously dynamic Duke forward. He will try to achieve something Zion Williams, Jayson Tatum and Paolo Banchero did not achieve — lead the Blue Devils to a national title as a freshman.
There was John Calipari coming back to Lexington. There is Pat Kelsey making Louisville formidable again. Don’t forget the retirements of three Atlantic Coast Conference coaches: Tony Bennett (Virginia); Jim Larranaga (Miami) and Leonard Hamilton (Florida State).
But this week, another personality will push those stories aside. This week is the ultimate Old Friend Alert.
This week belongs to Rick Pitino.
Less than two full seasons into his return to St. John’s, Pitino will command the attention of New York City and beyond when his Big East-leading program hosts Marquette at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday in Madison Square Garden. That game will air on FS1.
At Seat Geek, you’ll pay well over $1,100 for two seats close to the court. If you’re willing to slide back several rows, you can find two together for $759 at StubHub. It’s No. 11 (Marquette) vs. No. 12.
The Red Storm attracted 19,196 for their win Saturday over Providence at The Garden. Odds are they will sell the remaining 616 seats to fill the World’s Most Famous Arena on Tuesday.
For Pitino, that’s simply Act I. Act II comes at 8 p.m. Friday in a game that will air on WDRB locally and nationally on Fox Sports. The Red Storm will travel to Storrs, Connecticut, to play Danny Hurley and the two-time defending national champion Huskies.
Pitino lost three games to Hurley last season — the third one ensuring that St. John’s missed the NCAA Tournament.
Pitino was one of the first coaches to call out Hurley for his wild on-court behavior. Hurley fired back by saying, “Everybody’s trying to get what we have (at UConn).”
The two ferocious personalities took it up at notch at the Big East Tournament, which nearly resulted in the ejection of a St. John’s fan who was sitting at courtside. Hurley and Pitino shook hands and complimented each other at Big East Media Day last fall.
But Friday night in Storrs won’t be so warm and fuzzy.
Although St. John’s has won 19 of 22 games, some people are not convinced Pitino’s team is a legitimate threat to do something remarkable in March.
At ESPN.com, Joe Lunardi listed the Red Storm as a 6-seed in the bracket he shared Tuesday morning. St. John’s also earned the last 6-seed spot at the Bracket Matrix.
Pitino is already a lock to become the first coach to take six programs to the tournament: Boston University (one team); Providence (one); Kentucky (six); Louisville (13) and Iona (two). St. John’s has not won the Big East regular season title since … 1992.
Pitino is having quite a year. His son, Richard, has New Mexico (18-4) parked in first place in the Mountain West Conference. Kevin Willard, one of his favorite former assistants, has Maryland (17-5) back in the AP Top 25. And Mark Pope, a captain on his 1996 NCAA championship team, is doing excellent work at Kentucky.
But at 72, Pitino remains driven to make one more mammoth national splash.
“I don’t think there’s a game that’s been played that we haven’t been for real,” Pitino told Zach Braziller of the New York Post. (Story link.)
“Nobody’s blown us out. We’ve fought everybody tooth and nail. You see how hard they play. We’ve been on television every single night. So I don’t think there’s any mystery with us. I think (our detractors) know our frailties, they know our strengths.
What the computer formulas and doubters have not seen from St. John’s are victories over elite opponents. The Red Storm are ranked No. 24, five spots ahead of Louisville, five spots behind Kentucky, in the NCAA Net formula used by the tournament selection committee to pick and seed the field.
Their sole Quad I win came by 10 points at Xavier last month. The Red Storm has yet to play UConn or Marquette — and lost when they visited Creighton, which is tied with Marquette for second in the Big East. At Ken Pomeroy’s analytics site, Pitino’s non-conference strength of schedule ranked No. 170.
But the Johnnies are also only four or five possessions away from being unbeaten. Pitino’s team lost a 1-point, double overtime game to Baylor on a buzzer beater — after a timing error.
Georgia beat St. John’s by 3 in The Bahamas. Then the Red Storm missed two shots in the final 6 seconds of a 57-56 loss to Creighton on New Year’s Eve.
Since then … Pitino’s team has won eight straight, the seventh-longest winning streak in the nation. None of those wins have come against teams that are projected to to make the NCAA field.
All that can change this week.
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