St. John's-Georgetown rivalry can get heated in a hurry
St. John's forward Bryce Hopkins looks on against the Iona Gaels in the second half of an NCAA men’s basketball game at Madison Square Garden on Dec. 13, 2025. Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
WASHINGTON — If one knows only a handful of things about Big East history, they very likely include ‘The Sweater Game,’ when No. 1 St. John’s and Chris Mullin hosted No. 2 Georgetown and Patrick Ewing at the Garden in 1985. Hoyas coach John Thompson opened his sport coat to reveal a replica of the chevron sweater that was Red Storm coach Lou Carnesecca’s signature attire at the time.
Even in the years since the rivalry was at its height, matchups like Wednesday night's New Year’s Eve matchup between St. John’s and Georgetown at Capital One Arena have always had a certain high level of competitiveness, though it’s taken on some different forms of late.
Before the 2023-24 season, when St. John’s hired coach Rick Pitino and Georgetown lured coach Ed Cooley from Providence, one couldn’t help but think it would awaken the kind of on-court battles from yesteryear. It hasn’t exactly done that — the Red Storm swept the season series each of the past two years — but there have been hotly contested off-court battles to land players.
Bryce Hopkins transferred from Providence last March, choosing Pitino and St. John’s a week after visiting Cooley and Georgetown. Some saw it as an upset because Hopkins left Kentucky after his freshman year and played an all-Big East season for Cooley and the Friars as a sophomore.
Soon after, the Storm’s Vince Iwuchukwu transferred to Georgetown. He was playing well averaging 11.8 points in four games, until an undisclosed medical procedure sidelined him in mid-November. He was listed as "questionable" for the game against his former team.
Cooley was approached about Hopkins decision at the NBA Draft soon after and said “that one hurt.”
Asked further about it in October, Cooley replied, “I think he chose where he thought he could go and develop to be the best player he could be. And I thought he chose a coach that’s going to push him to be the best player he can be.”
So given the circumstances of his transfer, it was going to be unavoidable that Hopkins would be under the spotlight for Hoyas fans Wednesday night. And Hopkins has already been one of the most scrutinized players in St. John’s circles because he not only hasn’t produced the way he did for Providence but also because Pitino has said he needs to change his personality and become an “Alpha Dog.”
In 50 games over three season — two badly shortened by injury — Hopkins averaged 15.8 points and 8.5 rebounds. Entering the date with the Hoyas, he was averaging 13.9 points and 4.4 rebounds. Moreover, he hasn’t been the assertive force he was as a Friar.
Hopkins had 14 points, four assists and three rebounds against Harvard before the Christmas layoff and he said afterward, “I know what type of coach Coach P is. . . . and I came here to be pushed. . . He knows what it takes to be a great player. So, whatever he expects from me, I'm going to do it.”
Even though both programs had declined from their heights, there remained a certain dislike for one another when they played.
The Storm’s Amir Garrett rifled a ball off the face of the Hoyas' Jabril Trawick as he was falling out of bounds in the teams’ first meeting in 2012-13 and after the rematch there was huge skirmish in the handshake line that also involved D’Angelo Harrison and led to his suspension. In a 2017-18 meeting the Storm’s Amir Alibegovich and Georgetown’s Bradley Hayes mixed it up on the court and Mullin, now St. John’s coach, had to be separated from Hoyas coach John Thompson III.
Sir’Dominic Pointer might have put it best when he said after the 2013 skirmish, “I don’t think it goes back to any one incident — it’s like you get born into it when you come to one of the schools.”
The skirmishes of late are different than they were then. Transfers are commonplace and decisions get made on NIL dollars and the chance to become more attractive to the NBA or an even higher-paying college.
Still, there’s been enough going on between Pitino’s Storm and Cooley’s Hoyas since the two took the reins of their programs to raise temperatures.
It feels like it’s only a matter of time until some of it at last spills back into their games.
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.
