Roger Rubin: St. John's Rick Pitino says Dylan Darling could 'captain' Red Storm next season
St. John's Red Storm guard Dylan Darling scores a layup past Georgetown Hoyas guard Malik Mack after stealing the ball in the second half of a Big East men’s basketball game at Madison Square Garden on Tuesday, March 3, 2026. Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
One of the mantras that St. John’s coach Rick Pitino often preaches to his team is that they should play without fear of failure. In the back half of this season, Dylan Darling has exemplified it as much as any member of the 13th-ranked Red Storm. He mostly has come off the bench, but the number of key steals and critical shots he’s made late in games have been piling up.
To hear him tell it, this is the kind of player the junior point guard envisioned being for the Storm when he decided to transfer from Idaho State after earning the 2025 Big Sky Conference Player of the Year award.
The one that early this season didn’t play well, looked overmatched against high major competition and couldn’t make a three-pointer to save his life (he missed 14 of his first 15 attempts from the arc)? That’s the guy he never expected to be.
And he worried that Pitino might have regretted gambling on him to be the backup point guard.
“After how I started a couple months ago, wasn’t sure if he was going to want to keep me,” Darling said Monday at a team appearance at the Applebee’s in Fresh Meadows.
It’s a different story today. Darling has been in the starting five for St. John’s last three games. And given the success, it would be no surprise if he’s still there when the top-seeded Red Storm (26-5) play a Big East Tournament quarterfinal Thursday at the Garden against the winner of the Wednesday first-round game between No. 8 Butler and No. 9 Providence.
Pitino was nearly effusive in his praise for the 6-1 Darling after he played 36 minutes and finished with nine points and five assists in Friday’s victory at Seton Hall that gave St. John’s its second straight Big East regular-season championship.
“This young man is going to develop into a beloved point guard for the fans,” Pitino said, gesturing to Darling. “If [Zuby Ejiofor] rubs off against [him] enough, maybe he’ll be the captain next year.”
“It was cool hearing that from him,” Darling said. “I’m glad he thinks that highly of my game.”
In the Storm’s past 16 games, in which they are 15-1, Darling is averaging 8.8 points on 46% shooting plus 2.4 assists and 1.3 steals.
“I always knew it was going to work out,” Darling said of turning his season around.
“I knew it was going to take an adjustment . . . I think that’s just the Pitino effect with how hard we practice and how we get after each other. I just think I’ve gotten a lot better in every facet of my game.”
The notion that Pitino planted last week of Darling becoming a team captain confirms that he envisions him as part of the 2026-27 roster. Also last week, Pitino said he was “100%” that sophomore wing Joson Sanon would be back. And at another point, the Hall of Fame coach suggested that sophomore big man Ruben Prey deserved to start.
When St. John’s was dropping high-profile non-conference games in November and December, Pitino pointed out that the Storm had a slew of new players in the rotation — including four of the starters — and that they had not become accustomed to playing together yet. The teams they lost to such as Alabama and Iowa State had worked the NCAA transfer portal but also returned a number of key pieces.
We’re not saying that any of those three or Lefteris Liotopoulos is certain to start next season. Pitino and his staff have excelled at working the portal to bring in high-level experienced talent.
But this might suggest that next season, the Storm might not need as long to jell.
Darling said that he and Pitino haven’t even begun a conversation about next season but said that if he were asked back, he’d return.
“I definitely think there could be a good nucleus,” Darling said.
“It’s going to be tough having to replace four starters, three all-league guys [Ejiofor, Bryce Hopkins and Dillon Mitchell] and one of the best shooters in the country [Oziyah Sellers]. It’s going to be hard, but they’ve proven that they can do it. And that would be exciting.”
Roger Rubin returned to Newsday in 2018 to write about high schools, colleges and baseball following 20 years at the Daily News. A Baseball Hall of Fame voter since 2011, he has covered 13 MLB postseasons and 14 NCAA Final Fours.
