Recruiting Update: St. John’s

By Zach Smart

Top-flight recruits have become a rarity at St. John’s in this day and age, though the signings of guys like Malik Boothe and Justin Burrell brought some resurgence for a New York City-based, Christian school that prays some of the city’s talented youth stay home.

Right now, it would appear that Norm Roberts suffers from the same disease that has been encountered at Maryland.

In a high school hotbed climate, it’s hard to get kids to stay home. Especially when so many of the city’s youth follow the NBA pipedream.

In a city where IS8 games tend to generate more interest than the Knicks do, young guns are courted by a number of high-end basketball coaches—Jim Calhoun (UConn), Jamie Dixon (Pitt), and Jay Wright (Villanova), to name a few.

Some of the New York area players just flat-out fit into the other coaches’ style and system better.

St. John’s has bit the bullet before, and they will continue to scour the city playgrounds and Long Island/Westchester powerhouses for talent.

“We're going to try to recruit the best kids in New York no matter what. We're always going to try to," said Roberts earlier this year.

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“You know, sometimes kids that live in a rural area will say, ‘I’m sick of living in this rural, country area. I want to go somewhere in the metropolitan area.’ Sometimes you have the city kids say, ‘I’m sick of living in the city, I want to go somewhere else.’ And that’s what happens. What we’ve got to do, is get the guys that are the best, the guys that want to stay home, that want to be here and make them as good as they can possibly be.”

Trevon Hughes, a New York native who plays for Wisconsin and Tyshon Edmonson, a freshman guard from Kentucky who plays for St. John’s, is perhaps indicative of this statement.

“It’s always been that way,” Roberts continued, harking back on the days of Chris Mullin and Mark Jackson, the golden age of St. John’s basketball. “St. John’s, for a long time, did not get everybody. Ed Pinckney went to Villanova, Rod Strickland went to DePaul, Kenny Smith went to North Carolina but what happened here is they got Mark Jackson. You didn’t worry about other guys going (out of New York). So we’ve got to deal with the guys we’ve got.”

The Johnnies have already secured a pair of NYC-bred ballers in Omari Lawrence and Dwight Hardy.

Lawrence, a 6-foot-4 guard, chose St. John’s over Georgetown, Marquette, Pitt, Xavier, and Memphis. Hardy, who starred at the NYC’s JFK before prolonging his career at Indian Hills Junior College in Iowa.

With the recent hiring of guys like Kimani Young and the presence of Director of Basketball Operations Billy Singleton, Roberts definitely has help with recruiting pitches. The New York state of mind will hopefully lure the highly sought-after youngins into staying put, remaining in the stomping grounds and competing for the odds of a berth in the NCAA tournament.

Right now, the Red Storm are still chasing Lance "Born Ready" Stephenson, one of the country's top guards and a super scorer with an NBA body. They've also kept a close eye on Mount Vernon's Sherrod Wright, a quick-strike shooter who can go to the tin and create his own shot. Wright, a product of Mount Vernon High School, will play a schedule front-loaded with national powers this season. They have also thrown their hat in the ring for Patterson (NC) School's Vincent Council, a transplanted NYC point guard who has already left the big city for peace and quiet. Adding a little more local talent each year will certainly increase the NCAA Basketball Odds for SJU in the future of dancing again in March!