Rick Pitino leaves Iona, signs multi-year deal with St. John's / News - Basketnews.com

After three seasons with Iona, Rick Pitino has signed a six-year deal with St. John's.

Credit: BNS Credit BNS

Rick Pitino is making the move from Iona to St. John's.The 70-year-old Hall of Fame coach has agreed in principle to a six-year deal to become the Red Storm's newest coach on Monday, and an introductory press conference is expected to be held Tuesday at 12 p.m. at Madison Square Garden.

Pitino spent the last three seasons with the Gaels, in his return to college basketball after a coaching stint with Panathinaikos in Greece in 2019 and 2020. Iona went a combined 64-22 overall and 40-9 in regular-season conference play.

The Gaels won back-to-back MAAC regular season titles in each of the last two years. They also won the MAAC Tournament in 2021 and 2023.

Iona's 43-year NCAA Tournament victory drought remains intact, though, as the Gaels left the Big Dance empty-handed in their two trips under Pitino.

Pitino, a member of the Basketball Hall of Fame, comes with 1.127 games of college basketball coaching experience, with a career win-loss record of 834-293, which equates to a win percentage of 74%.

Pitino is one of two coaches to take three different schools to the Final Four - Providence, Kentucky and Louisville. He also won national championships in 1996 with Kentucky and at Louisville in 2013.

He was out of college basketball for three years after Louisville fired him 2017 following a recruiting scandal. As a result, the NCAA vacated 123 wins and the 2013 national championship.

St. John's will be the seventh program he's led in his 35 years as a college basketball head coach. Yet, Pitino has even coached teams outside of the United States, including Puerto Rico, Panathinaikos, and Greece before returning stateside with Iona in 2020.

Credit Twitter/RealPitino

Now the next challenge for Pitino will be helping the Red Storm get back to tournament play, where they haven’t been since the 2018-19 season when Chris Mullin led St. John’s to a First Four appearance.

Pitino had previously stated that Iona would be the final stop in his coaching career and that being home in New York played a big role in his decision.

He's also shared that he turned down several other Division I college basketball coaching offers since, but St. John's being not too far from his home on Winged Foot Golf Club led to plenty of speculation after St. John's parted ways with Mike Anderson earlier this month.

In November, five years since being fired by Louisville, Pitino was exonerated by the IARP, the NCAA's independent panel. He was cleared of any wrongdoing from the Louisville scandal, and he had been linked to rumors and other coaching job openings over the last month.

St. John's will be welcoming back Pitino to the Big East Conference, where he previously coached for Providence and Louisville.

The Red Storm went 18-15 this season. They finished 7-13 in conference play and got eliminated by eventual Big East Tournament champion Marquette in the quarterfinals of the Big East Tournament.

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