In another world, Rick Pitino is touting his backcourt as the best in the country.
St. John’s fans are gearing up for a single-digit seed in the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2015. Big East he is almost guaranteed a bye in the tournament. Playing in the Sweet 16 is considered realistic.
All of this might have happened if Walter Clayton Jr. had followed Pitino from Iona College to St. John’s University.
The ramifications of the decision to drop the Johnnies, who were last season’s MAAC Player of the Year, to their hometown school in Florida are still being felt.
In place of Creighton, St. John’s sent Jordan Dingle, the nation’s No. 2 scorer last year who fell well short of expectations, to Penn.
Meanwhile, the 6-foot-2 Creighton is averaging 16.3 points, 3.6 rebounds, 2.6 assists and shooting 36.3 percent from 3-point range, leading the University of Florida to the NCAA Tournament. On Tuesday night, Creighton led Florida to LSU while St. John’s suffered a heartbreaking loss, its seventh in nine games. It was the Gators’ sixth win in seven games, including wins against No. 13 Auburn and No. 22 Kentucky to boost their restart. Creighton was outstanding in both wins, making 10 3-pointers and scoring a total of 43 points.
Meanwhile, Dingle posted career lows in points (10.4), field goal percentage (39.6) and 3-point percentage (30.3). The other leading shooting guard, college transfer Nahiem Alleyne, also struggled with consistency, shooting just 33.8 percent from downtown. As a team, St. John’s ranks 221st in the nation in 3-point shooting percentage at 32.9 percent.
All of this confirms how costly hiring mistakes can be. Now, it should be noted that there was nothing else St. John’s could have done. Clayton wanted to be close to her home, where she grew up 245 miles from Gainesville, Fla., and to her pregnant girlfriend, Tatyana Barney, who gave birth to a baby girl in December. . Still, it’s a blow considering how this season has played out.
St. John’s has 5 wins and 6 losses in games decided by single digits. In games where the difference is 6 points or less with 5 minutes left, the score is 3 wins and 8 losses. The team doesn’t have a closer. That was evident throughout the season with some disappointing second-half performances. The Johnnies are 2-9 in Game 4 and have held a lead at halftime in six of those games.
Iona transfer Dannis Jenkins has a lot going for him from a leadership, scoring and distribution standpoint. He seems drained late. It’s hard to blame him. I also can’t help but imagine what his season would have been like if Clayton had transferred to Queen’s like his backcourt mate at Iona.
Together they led Iona to the NCAA Tournament as dynamic, interchangeable guards. After those two, the Gaels were the only team at the dance to hold a lead at halftime against eventual national champion Connecticut. Several times during the season, Pitino raved about them, saying they were as good as any backcourt he had ever coached and were among the best in the country.
Jenkins has been St. John’s best and most consistent player to date. Creighton has grown in Florida and is getting even better after a somewhat slow start.
There are a lot of “what ifs” as this once-promising season looks doomed for the NIT. What would happen if AJ Storr, 20th in Wisconsin’s scoring list, stayed? What if the staff was able to retain junior college transfers Jaxel Lendeborg and forward Omar Stanley, who excelled at UAB and Boise State, respectively? What if St. John’s had found a way to win a close loss, especially one-point upsets to No. 4 Marquette and No. 17 Creighton? What if center Joel Soriano hadn’t struggled as much over the last nine games and continued to play at a high level?
But the biggest what-if plaguing St. John’s is losing Walter Clayton Jr. He is exactly what this team is missing.
