STORM CLOUDS CIRCLE MULLIN
After two straight flops, Mullin’s third year at St. John’s is going down the drain for three reasons
WHEN Chris Mullin was hired, the hope was he would follow in Fred Hoiberg’s footsteps as the favorite son who turned around his foundering alma mater.
Instead, it has followed the script of Clyde Drexler and Eddie Jordan — NBA alumni who struggled while coaching their former schools.
Two-and-a-half years into his first job as a coach at any level, Mullin has an ugly 32-53 overall record, and an even worse 8-36 mark in Big East play. St. John’s is 0-8 in the conference for the second time in three years, already with three losses to expected doormats Georgetown (twice) and DePaul entering Tuesday’s home contest with Creighton.
Athletic director Anton Goff insists his confidence in Mullin’s ability is undiminished, saying, “He has my full support.” Yet after SJU f i nished 8-24 and 14-19 in Mullin’ss f irst two seasons, this was SUPPOSED to be the season St. John’s started to win, with the NIT seen by the coaching staff as a minimum goal. Instead, thee Red Storm may finish in the league’s basement.
Here are three factors that have contributed to what is looking like another lost season in Queens:
Coaching
The Post spoke to several sources in and around the program who believe a coaching staff shake-up should be in order. The staff ’s lack of experience, aside from primary recruiter Matt Abdelmassih, has been glaring. Mullin and assistant coaches Mitch Richmond and Greg St. Jean never coached before at the college level, and sources believe St. John’s needs to hire a former head coach to aid Mullin. During the summer, disgraced former Rutgers coach Mike Rice was around the program, and there was hope he could be brought on board, but it never materialized.
The team’s late-game execution has been lacking. In Saturday’s double-overtime l oss to Georgetown, for i nsta nce, St . John’s blew a f ive-point lead in the f inal 24 seconds of the first overtime — Kassoum Yakwe fouled Marcus Derrickson taking a 3-pointer, and Derrickson was allowed to tie the game with 3.9 seconds left on another 3. Afterwards, Mullin said his preference to foul up three wasn’t communicated to the players. Of the eight league losses, six have been by seven points or fewer.
“It all circles back to one thing — experience, or lack thereof,” a source close to the program said. “When yo u don’t h ave that experience, people keep asking questions without any answers.”
Another issue is shot selection, with players given a sizeable amount of freedom. Mullin, the source close to the program said, will rarely criticize poor shots
in- game, preferring to focus on that area during film sessions. The motion offense, intended to create mismatches, can sometimes look scattershot, players going one-on-one late in the shot clock.
The source added that an NBA mindset has permeated the entire program. With a college team, every day is ideally to be consumed with recruiting your own players, helping them on and off the court and building relationships. But at SJU, the source said, that hasn’t happened enough. It has factored into the roster turnover, with 22 different scholarship players in three years.
“They’ve lost some kids who could still be in the program,” the source said.
“They treat them like they’re professionals,” said a parent of a player, who didn’t believe that was necessarily the wrong thing to do. “Sometimes, they could use more structure. It’s not as regimented [as other places].”
A prominent St. John’s donor, maintaining faith in Mullin, believes the blame for the program’s current state should be placed on the men who brought in the coach — president Conrado “Bobby” Gempesaw and vice president for administration, secretary and general counsel Joe Oliva — for not providing enough support and direction. He didn’t fault Goff because the athletic director only started 14 months ago, and Mullin wasn’t his hire. “Chris Mullin’s not failing. Those two guys that
hired him are failing,” the donor said. “They should be asking Chris, ‘How can I help?’ There’s no support. If they ever provided a vision, direction and leadership for the basketball program, not only would I donate more money, so would many other passionate alums.”
Mullin has repeatedly said he has faith in his coaching staff and doesn’t believe it is the reason for the team’s winless record in league play. Goff said the two would discuss everything about the program when the season is complete.
Marcus Lovett
A Big East coach, speaking on condition of anonymity, believes criticism of Mullin and his staff is unfair because of the southpaw shooting guard’s absence. The team was built on a three-guard offense, featuring LoVett, Justin Simon, and Shamorie Ponds. With LoVett (out since Nov. 26 with a sprained MCL that will cost him the rest of the season) appearing in just seven games, the Red Storm’s offense has sunk to ninth in the Big East in scoring (74.3 points per game) and fieldgoal percentage (42.6 percent) and last in 3-point shooting (32 percent), after it was fourth in scoring and fifth in 3-point shooting a year ago.
“They’re playing really damn competitive and they’re playing everybody really tough,” the Big East coach said. “They had an offense set up to have two scoring guards. They lost a really good player. That’s a tough adjustment to make on the fly.”
Roster
The departure of four players from last year’s team — Federico Mussini and Richard Freudenberg went overseas to play professionally, while Malik Ellison and Darien Williams transferred — has put too much pressure on this group. Gambling on troubled five-star center Zach Brown, who never made it to campus after getting arrested for robbing a Walgreens, backfired. Four-star wing Sidney Wilson abruptly transferred after two months in the program.
With all that said, the roster does look strong for next season, barring signif icant defections. The only key player set to move on is senior wing Bashir Ahmed. Guard Mikey Dixon (Quinnipiac) and center Sedee Keita (South Carolina), a pair of transfers who had to sit out this season per NCAA rules, could be starters next year. Abdelmassih has brought in a strong three-man recruiting class, led by skilled four-star power forward J’Raan Brooks. Versatile guard Greg Williams and physical forward Josh Roberts should be counted on to contribute, along with freshman Boubacar Diakite, who is redshirting this year following knee surgery.
It’s still too early to call the Chris Mullin experiment a failure. But it’s fair to start wondering if it was a mistake.