March Madness: When the going gets tough for St. John's, Dylan Darling is not afraid

SAN DIEGO — Sometimes the nickname is perfect and it just sticks. That’s the case with St. John’s point guard Dylan Darling, who is better known as “Bells” to the Red Storm players.

On Jan. 24, Darling had just scored all of his 11 points in a comeback win at Xavier to give coach Rick Pitino his 900th career victory. In speaking about the 6-1 junior’s  courage in making big plays in critical situations, Pitino exclaimed, “[They’re] as big as church bells!”

Darling has been living up to the moniker ever since — making big-time plays in big-time situations in the Red Storm's wins over Connecticut and Seton Hall, among others — but never more so than on Sunday night, when he made the biggest shot in 27 seasons of St. John's basketball to send the program to its first NCAA Tournament Sweet 16 since 1999.

With the score tied in the final seconds of regulation, the southpaw drove for a righthanded layup as time expired to give St. John’s a 67-65 victory over Kansas at Viejas Arena. Darling's basket put the Red Storm in Friday's  East Regional semifinals in Washington, where they will meet overall No. 1 seed Duke.

DYLAN DARLING GAME WINNER OMG 🚨

ST. JOHN'S ADVANCES TO THE SWEET 16 🤯 pic.twitter.com/cgtCSgKHe5

— NCAA March Madness (@MarchMadnessMBB) March 22, 2026

Darling had shot 0-for-4 before the winning basket and hadn't scored a point.

“I can't take too much credit,” he said. “I had two points tonight, probably the biggest two points in my life.”

The fifth-seeded Red Storm went ahead by 14 points with 8:08 remaining and by nine points with 4:19 left, but the fourth-seeded Jayhawks tied the score at 65 with 14.1 seconds to play. Kansas  had four fouls to give and burned all of them in trying to get the last ticks off the clock and reach overtime. But after the fourth foul, the Jayhawks had to play the Red Storm straight up when St. John’s inbounded the ball near midcourt with 3.9 seconds to play.

“[It’s] the funniest thing I've ever been involved with: We're going to run a play but they've got fouls to give and Bells comes up to me and says, ‘Run power,’ ” Pitino said. “So I walk away and I [thought], 'Wait a second — he hasn't scored a bucket and he wants to run a play for himself?’ [But] I'm thinking as I'm walking, ‘but he's Bells.’

“So real proud of him because to want the ball when you haven't made a shot is unbelievable.”

Said Darling, “By the time they ran out of fouls, there was [3.9] seconds left and the play Coach was trying to run [right after the free throws], there wasn't enough time for it,” Darling said. “I threw the suggestion out and I don't think Coach really had a choice at that point in time . . . So we went with it.”

Darling took the inbounds pass and went right at the basket. He saw neither of the Jayhawks’ shot-blocking big men near the rim, got a smidge past Kansas’ Elmarko Jackson and got the shot off just over his attempt to block it.

Then Darling strode toward the roaring section of Red Storm fans, exhorting them to cheer louder, and got a hero’s swarming from his celebrating teammates.

“Just being himself” is how Ian Jackson described what he saw from Darling in those final seconds.

“He understood how much time was on the clock, he called for his own number after he felt like was a bad night and pulled through for us,” Jackson said. “It was amazing.”

St. John’s brought in the top-ranked transfer class before this season, according to 247sports.com. Darling, who came from Idaho State, where he’d been the 2025 Big Sky Conference Player of the Year, was the sixth of the seven transfers and probably didn’t factor much in the ranking. He’d been thought of as a backup point guard — and early on appeared to be adjusting to a new level — before his heroics started piling up and he was moved to the starting lineup.

“First thing you have to do when you're evaluating is understand they all lie about their height — so I thought I was getting a 6-2 guard until I met him [and] found out he was the same size as me,” Pitino said. “Everybody said the most glowing things about him, that he has no fear at all . . . [and] sometimes guys like that who are always trying to prove themselves really reach back and work at it.”

Darling took four three-point shots, missing them all, and had four assists and two steals before the final sequence. He’s been in a terrible shooting slump, too. In a span of 19 games earlier in the season, he shot 22-for-49 from three-point range,  but he is 3-for-32 in the Red Storm’s past eight games.

No matter. The courageous point guard  made a shot St. John's fans likely will remember for the rest of their lives.

“[I’m] just happy to be a part of something bigger than ourselves.” Darling said, “knowing that New York takes pride in the Johnnies and are just happy to keep on dancing.”