Rick Pitino was the toast of the town on Monday, and he did exactly that after accepting the St. John’s head coaching job.
The 70-year-old Pitino joined coaching disciple Stephen Masiello and agent Evan Daniels at the Essex House hotel in Midtown Manhattan to celebrate his new six-year contract to take over the Red Storm men’s basketball team with some bubbly on Monday night.
Just days removed from a first-round loss coaching Iona, Pitino was all smiles in the company of his agent and former director of basketball operations at the New Rochelle school.
Pitino won two MAAC regular season titles and reached the NCAA Tournament twice with Iona.
He will be introduced as coach during a noon press conference at Madison Square Garden on Tuesday.
The Hall of Famer and two-time NCAA championship-winning coach with New York roots had been linked to the job with the Red Storm since shortly after St. John’s fired Mike Anderson earlier this month after four mostly disappointing seasons.
Pitino, who also coached the Knicks and Celtics, didn’t want to move from his home in Mamaroneck, N.Y., on the course at Winged Foot Golf Club and got to enjoy some of the city Monday night.
He met with St. John’s higher-ups on campus on Sunday, including university president Rev. Brian Shanley — who nearly hired Pitino at Providence 12 years ago.
They went over everything Pitino believed was needed to create a winning team, from improving facilities to Name, Image and Likeness plans.
Pitino plans to make St. John’s the toast of the Big Apple again like the program was during its glory years
“I want to make it a top-20 program. I want to go back to Louie [Carnesecca’s] days when they were a perennial power, not only in the Big East, but the entire country,” Pitino, a two-time national champion who has led three different schools — Kentucky, Providence and Louisville — to the Final Four, told The Post’s Zach Braziller in a phone interview. “I wouldn’t even consider taking it if I didn’t think that was a distinct possibility.”
