I had a long talk about St. John's with a friend who is a well-respected basketball coach. My main question was one I asked on this board, "Can the 40 minutes of hell pressure defense system work against Big East Level play with big men who can pass and multiple shooters who can hit threes?" His answer was that St. John's needs better players and to spend more time practicing offense.
I had a second question that related to something in our past at STJ. My main awareness of Rick Pitino is of the Knick coach whose team deteriorated after the loss of Mark Jackson in the Charles Smith trade and of the Celtics coach who tried to not focus on defense. But my question was about something at STJ. Does Pitino throw his players under the bus for the sake of winning? Is winning all that matters to him? The moment I am proudest of in terms of STJ demonstrating care and loyalty to its players was Steve Lavin coming in as the new coach and making sure that the shell of a basketball player "worst knee injury ever seen in the history of STJ" and history of dyslexia named Rob Thomas finished his degree with full support of the STJ community.
If we wind up with Pitino and he treats himself as more important than the young men under his care, he will go on my Mike Jarvis "screwed the pooch" list of worst STJ coaches.
I had a second question that related to something in our past at STJ. My main awareness of Rick Pitino is of the Knick coach whose team deteriorated after the loss of Mark Jackson in the Charles Smith trade and of the Celtics coach who tried to not focus on defense. But my question was about something at STJ. Does Pitino throw his players under the bus for the sake of winning? Is winning all that matters to him? The moment I am proudest of in terms of STJ demonstrating care and loyalty to its players was Steve Lavin coming in as the new coach and making sure that the shell of a basketball player "worst knee injury ever seen in the history of STJ" and history of dyslexia named Rob Thomas finished his degree with full support of the STJ community.
If we wind up with Pitino and he treats himself as more important than the young men under his care, he will go on my Mike Jarvis "screwed the pooch" list of worst STJ coaches.