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After Return to the NCAAs, St. John’s Looks to the Future
By DAVE CALDWELL. WALL STREET JOURNAL. Greater New York Section
March 22, 2015 4:46 p.m. ET
CHARLOTTE, N.C.—Minutes after St. John’s season had ended with a loss to San Diego State on Friday night, Red Storm coach Steve Lavin declared it to be “the most gratifying year” of his coaching career. It was the end of a season in which he led St. John’s (21-12) back into the NCAA tournament for the first time in four years.
Considering the 50-year-old Lavin has been either an assistant or head coach for 19 seasons, it was a bold statement.
Lavin now wades into one of the biggest challenges of his coaching career, as he enters the final year of a six-year, $8.75 million contract. His team is graduating five seniors and may also lose two other key players.
Lavin said Saturday that the contract has “never been an issue.” “The best contract I’ve ever had is the best contract any coach at this university has ever had,” Lavin said. “My focus has never been getting a long-term extension.”
Lavin is 81-53 in five seasons at St. John’s, including 40-30 in Big East play.
But the Red Storm have won just two of 10 games in the postseason under Lavin: one in the Big East Tournament game and another in the NIT.
His first class at St. John’s had largely been recruited by his predecessor, Norm Roberts, and that group, as he said Friday, “got us back after a decade in the desert.” Lavin missed all but four games of his second season because he was battling prostate cancer. St. John’s won 20 games in each of the two seasons since.
“It’s rare you get to do that, where you inherit someone else’s players and they take you on a wonderful ride,” he said, referring to the players whom Roberts recruited, “and you get your own players to do it again.”
Going forward, Lavin will have to get more out of his own recruits to take another postseason run.
Without shot-blocking force Chris Obekpa, suspended for reportedly failing a drug test, and with talented sophomore guard Rysheed Jordan falling into early foul trouble, St. John’s lost Friday, 76-64—a dismal way for five seniors, four of whom were starters, to bow out.
For the Red Storm, the futures for Obekpa and Jordan will be the biggest question.
When asked after the game if he expected Obekpa, a 6-foot-9 junior, to return, Lavin said, “We’ve been in communication and I wouldn’t be surprised at all if he doesn’t return to St. John’s.”
Jordan, who was regarded as Lavin’s most heralded recruit when he signed two years ago as a senior at Roberts Vaux High School in Philadelphia, might decide to turn pro.
Jordan has had some spectacular moments at St. John’s, including a second-half baseline dunk against San Diego State that helped the Red Storm stay in the game, but he has also encountered several personal setbacks. There was a one-game suspension early in his freshman year and a leave of absence this year that lasted one game.
Jordan hasn’t been made available to the media but was on a podium with five of his teammates during a news conference on Thursday, ahead of the San Diego State game.
Asked about the NBA, Jordan said, “I’m not focused on that right now.”
If Obekpa and Jordan were to leave, Lavin might be going into next season without the top six players from this year’s team, including seniors D’Angelo Harrison, Phil Greene IV, Jamal Branch and Sir’Dominic Pointer. The top six players scored all but 127 of the team’s 2,343 points.
Brandon Sampson, a highly-rated 6-foot-5 shooting guard from Madison Prep Academy in Baton Rouge, La., is among three high school seniors who are committed to attend St. John’s. Sampson would replace Harrison, who scored 2,178 points at St. John’s despite a suspension that cut short his second season.
Nonetheless, as the Red Storm wrapped up the season, Lavin remained proud of his departing players. All five seniors are on schedule to earn their degrees in May.
“Their resiliency, their spirit inspires me,” Lavin said after Friday’s game. “I mean, watching that grit and that determination, that resolve—they were so resolute, tenacious comes to mind as a word, they’re just a tenacious group that would not be denied, which, you know, which is why they’re all going to earn their degrees.”
By DAVE CALDWELL. WALL STREET JOURNAL. Greater New York Section
March 22, 2015 4:46 p.m. ET
CHARLOTTE, N.C.—Minutes after St. John’s season had ended with a loss to San Diego State on Friday night, Red Storm coach Steve Lavin declared it to be “the most gratifying year” of his coaching career. It was the end of a season in which he led St. John’s (21-12) back into the NCAA tournament for the first time in four years.
Considering the 50-year-old Lavin has been either an assistant or head coach for 19 seasons, it was a bold statement.
Lavin now wades into one of the biggest challenges of his coaching career, as he enters the final year of a six-year, $8.75 million contract. His team is graduating five seniors and may also lose two other key players.
Lavin said Saturday that the contract has “never been an issue.” “The best contract I’ve ever had is the best contract any coach at this university has ever had,” Lavin said. “My focus has never been getting a long-term extension.”
Lavin is 81-53 in five seasons at St. John’s, including 40-30 in Big East play.
But the Red Storm have won just two of 10 games in the postseason under Lavin: one in the Big East Tournament game and another in the NIT.
His first class at St. John’s had largely been recruited by his predecessor, Norm Roberts, and that group, as he said Friday, “got us back after a decade in the desert.” Lavin missed all but four games of his second season because he was battling prostate cancer. St. John’s won 20 games in each of the two seasons since.
“It’s rare you get to do that, where you inherit someone else’s players and they take you on a wonderful ride,” he said, referring to the players whom Roberts recruited, “and you get your own players to do it again.”
Going forward, Lavin will have to get more out of his own recruits to take another postseason run.
Without shot-blocking force Chris Obekpa, suspended for reportedly failing a drug test, and with talented sophomore guard Rysheed Jordan falling into early foul trouble, St. John’s lost Friday, 76-64—a dismal way for five seniors, four of whom were starters, to bow out.
For the Red Storm, the futures for Obekpa and Jordan will be the biggest question.
When asked after the game if he expected Obekpa, a 6-foot-9 junior, to return, Lavin said, “We’ve been in communication and I wouldn’t be surprised at all if he doesn’t return to St. John’s.”
Jordan, who was regarded as Lavin’s most heralded recruit when he signed two years ago as a senior at Roberts Vaux High School in Philadelphia, might decide to turn pro.
Jordan has had some spectacular moments at St. John’s, including a second-half baseline dunk against San Diego State that helped the Red Storm stay in the game, but he has also encountered several personal setbacks. There was a one-game suspension early in his freshman year and a leave of absence this year that lasted one game.
Jordan hasn’t been made available to the media but was on a podium with five of his teammates during a news conference on Thursday, ahead of the San Diego State game.
Asked about the NBA, Jordan said, “I’m not focused on that right now.”
If Obekpa and Jordan were to leave, Lavin might be going into next season without the top six players from this year’s team, including seniors D’Angelo Harrison, Phil Greene IV, Jamal Branch and Sir’Dominic Pointer. The top six players scored all but 127 of the team’s 2,343 points.
Brandon Sampson, a highly-rated 6-foot-5 shooting guard from Madison Prep Academy in Baton Rouge, La., is among three high school seniors who are committed to attend St. John’s. Sampson would replace Harrison, who scored 2,178 points at St. John’s despite a suspension that cut short his second season.
Nonetheless, as the Red Storm wrapped up the season, Lavin remained proud of his departing players. All five seniors are on schedule to earn their degrees in May.
“Their resiliency, their spirit inspires me,” Lavin said after Friday’s game. “I mean, watching that grit and that determination, that resolve—they were so resolute, tenacious comes to mind as a word, they’re just a tenacious group that would not be denied, which, you know, which is why they’re all going to earn their degrees.”