St. John’s Wants the Next Level. First Comes the Next Possession.

Rick Pitino must connect the futures his players want with the work their teammates need. Getting there will test his methods as much as their habits.

By Jason Safford | Relentless Redstorm

Babacar Sane had a debt to settle after the Drexel exhibition. His arrangement with Quinn Ellis was simple: a dollar for every assist Ellis delivered to him. That night, the bill reached three. “I owe him three bucks when we get back to the locker room,” Sane said. The points belonged to Sane. His accounting made room for the passer.

Rick Pitino has a harder bargain to arrange. He needs scorers to value the screen they set alongside the shot they take. He needs defenders to recognize when chasing a steal leaves someone else stranded. He needs ambition to survive a possession spent helping another player succeed. In return, he owes his players more than an order to comply.

The bargain reaches toward the bench, too. A player can be wrong about the move he trusts. A coach can be wrong about the instruction meant to fix it. Pitino must decide when his system needs better execution and when its demands need adjustment. His players must recognize when the habits that brought them here cannot take them further.

Rutgers gave that work some urgency. St. John’s erased a 20-point deficit but needed four overtimes to escape, 104–99. Keyshawn Hall and Ian Jackson scored 24 points apiece. Ellis delivered nine assists. The Red Storm had enough ability to recover an afternoon it could not quite control. The season ahead will ask how often it needs to make that climb.

Pitino had already challenged the search for individual opportunities after Drexel. “Everyone else was hunting for shots,” he said while praising Ellis. He wanted defenders working through screens and chasing movement before anyone tried to score. Ellis understood that labor. Reed Bailey, Pitino said, understood how to move the ball, too. His task now is to spread that understanding without making everyone play alike.

Hall and Jackson have already shown how that can look. During the Rutgers comeback, Hall assisted Jackson’s three. Thirty seconds later, Jackson returned the favor. Each scorer became the other’s supplier. Their passing did not diminish their scoring. It gave each another way to reach it.

For Pitino, those possessions offer more than an example of unselfishness. They offer a way to explain what happens after a player releases the ball. Where can he move next? Which defender must choose between following him and helping elsewhere? A scorer needs to understand the opportunities his first decision creates. Otherwise, giving up the ball can feel like giving up his place in the offense.

Sane brings the teaching problem into sharper focus. After Drexel, Pitino questioned his fundamentals while praising his eagerness to learn. Against Rutgers, Sane scored 13 points in 15 minutes and committed three turnovers. Production and interruption came from the same player. Pitino must reduce one without draining the other. Sane must make room for correction without losing the force that makes him dangerous.

A coach cannot repair every breakdown with the same demand. A player who misses the opening needs different help from one who sees it late. Poor balance requires different work from a poor read. Repeating the instruction louder does not identify which problem occurred. Pitino has to locate the failure. His players have to describe what they saw, not merely confirm what they heard.

That exchange asks something uncomfortable of both sides. Players cannot treat every correction as a verdict on their talent. Coaches cannot treat every question as resistance. An opponent may change a coverage before the bench can intervene. The player needs enough freedom to respond and enough discipline to remain readable to his teammates. Pitino’s authority has to produce judgment, not dependence.

The next stage also involves choosing who can make those judgments together. In the second overtime against Rutgers, Bailey assisted baskets by Hall and Tounde Yessoufou. Ellis created the other three St. John’s field goals. Five baskets came from five assists. The ball found several finishers through two willing distributors. The lead still did not hold.

Pitino cannot select combinations on offensive promise alone. A group that passes beautifully may leave him short of rebounding. More size may crowd the space his scorers need. More pressure may expose defenders who cannot cover behind it. His strongest lineup may not contain his five most gifted players. It may contain the five who make one another’s decisions clearer.

Rutgers found productive work after the first shot. The Scarlet Knights collected 18 offensive rebounds. Christian Gurdak finished with 20 points and 15 boards. Those possessions give St. John’s a concrete assignment beyond playing harder. Someone must locate the rebounder while a teammate contests the attempt. Until someone secures the ball, the defense has more work to do.

Pitino’s pressure depends on those connections. When one defender attacks the ball, another inherits the opening behind him. A third must recognize where the next pass could go. The player pursuing the steal cannot act as though the risk belongs only to him. The coach cannot demand greater aggression without examining what supports it. Sometimes the adjustment will require a stronger effort. Sometimes it will require less exposure.

For a player pursuing the NBA, these assignments carry stakes beyond the next game. Professional basketball offers a possible livelihood, not simply a larger stage. A scorer asked to screen more can reasonably ask how that serves his development. A defender asked to stay home may wonder where he can show his range. Those questions need not compete with winning. They need answers more specific than a promise that winning solves everything.

Pitino can show how a screen opens a second chance for the screener. He can trace how an early pass creates a better return pass. He can explain why holding a defensive position frees a teammate to apply pressure. The player then has something to practice beyond obedience. He can understand where his freedom begins, what the role develops, and how the staff will judge his progress.

The player owes something in return. Not every useful action will deliver an immediate reward. The screen may free someone else for the only shot. The rotation may leave another defender collecting the rebound. Some possessions will end without the ball coming back. The challenge is to remain fully involved without requiring every sequence to prove his individual worth.

That is where Pitino’s choices become as important as his explanations. Minutes and praise must recognize the work he says he values. A sound decision should not become a mistake because the shot missed. A careless choice should not become a model because the ball went in. Players need to know which judgment will survive the result. Otherwise, the scoreboard becomes their only teacher.

Pitino’s PHD shorthand, passionate, hungry, driven, applies to him as well. He used those words to explain his own motivation when St. John’s introduced him in 2023. This group will test how that drive expresses itself. The hungry scorer may need to pass sooner. The driven coach may need to simplify. Both may have to surrender a familiar answer without surrendering the standard.

There is risk on either side. Pitino must allow some freedom before he can trust every decision. His players must invest in unfamiliar work before they know what it will bring. Neither can demand certainty from the other. They can demand clear expectations, honest explanations, and evidence that a correction changes the next attempt. Trust will have to survive a good idea that fails.

The coming games can offer quieter evidence than another enormous comeback. A corrected coverage could hold on the next trip. A scorer could clear space after passing instead of drifting toward the ball. Five players could recognize the same danger before Pitino calls timeout. Progress may arrive as a lead that survives an ordinary stretch of basketball. Nobody would need to rescue it.

Sane’s three-dollar debt recognized the teammate who made his night easier. Ahead lies work with no agreed price: the screen before the assist, the cut that clears the lane, the rebound that lets everyone run. Pitino has to make those actions part of the future he offers. His players have to keep choosing them when the credit goes elsewhere.

The next level may not announce itself with more points beside a player’s name. It may begin when he passes, keeps moving, and makes the next man harder to guard.