St. John's fires Mike Anderson; Rick Pitino reportedly top candidate

Updated Mar 10, 2023 5:11 pm EST

St. John's has parted ways with men's basketball coach Mike Anderson, the school announced Friday. The move came one day after the team took top-seeded Marquette to overtime in the Big East Tournament quarterfinals but came up just short in an upset bid.

Anderson went 68-56 in four seasons at St. John's. His best season came in 2020-21, when he led the team to a 16-11 record and was named Big East Coach of the Year. However, St. John's never made the NCAA Tournament during his tenure. Anderson had previous coaching stints at UAB, Missouri and Arkansas. 

The Red Storm went 18-15 during a rocky 2022-23 season, including 7-13 in Big East play to finish eighth in the conference standings. Their loss Thursday extended their streak of not reaching the conference tournament semifinals to 23 years.

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New York native Rick Pitino is reportedly a top candidate to replace Anderson at St. John's. Pitino has spent the last three seasons at Iona, located in the New York City suburb of New Rochelle, leading the Gaels to a combined 62–21 mark and an NCAA Tournament berth in 2021. Iona is set to play in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference Tournament semifinals Friday and could clinch another NCAA Tournament bid with a conference tournament title.

Pitino, a longtime coach with stops at Providence, Kentucky and the NBA's Knicks and Celtics, had been overshadowed by multiple scandals surrounding his sixteen-year tenure at Louisville that ultimately resulted in his 2017 firing and the vacating of Louisville's 2013 national championship won under Pitino. However, a November 2022 NCAA ruling about alleged illegal payments to recruits at Louisville cleared Pitino of any wrongdoing. The 70-year-old Pitino is also receiving interest from Texas Tech, whose head coach Mark Adams resigned on Wednesday.

Anderson is the second Big East head coach to be fired after his team was eliminated from the 2023 conference tournament, joining Georgetown's Patrick Ewing, who was let go on Thursday.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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