St. John’s suits up for exhibition debut, but don’t read too much into starting lineup

Rick Pitino withheld Bryce Hopkins from starting lineup for Saturday’s exhibition game, but St. John’s coach says lineups will be fluid throughout season for No. 5 Red Storm. (Photo by NBC News)

NEW YORK — As St. John’s sees its first live action of the season in an exhibition contest Saturday, the Red Storm will do so with perhaps its biggest transfer portal pickup coming off the bench.

Head coach Rick Pitino tipped his hand by revealing the five players that will start Saturday afternoon against Towson in the first of two preseason tuneups before the campaign officially begins on November 3 against Quinnipiac. However, senior forward Bryce Hopkins — who joined the Johnnies in the offseason after leaving Big East rival Providence — will not be one of them.

“We’ll go with Oziyah (Sellers) at the one, Ian (Jackson) at the two, Joson (Sanon) at the three, Dillon Mitchell at the four and Zuby (Ejiofor) at the five,” Pitino said at St. John’s media day Thursday afternoon. “But all ten guys will play. It’s not necessarily the top five, it’s just the five we’re gonna go with against Towson.”

The Hall of Fame architect prefaced the announcement by reminding the media at his press conference that there would be multiple starting lineups over the course of the season, a reassurance to not sound the alarm before the fifth-ranked Red Storm attempts a shot for the first time. The decision to not start Hopkins was not rooted in performance or lack thereof — Pitino raved about the former all-Big East big man’s conditioning and weight loss since arriving in Queens — but one in which the former Friar is still rehabbing the injuries that cost him most of the past two seasons.

“Bryce has been good and solid the entire summer. I’m not after good and I’m not after solid, I’m after great and passionate. He’s trying to be good, and I want him to be great. I want him to have a mamba mentality, and he doesn’t have it. If he develops that, he’ll be one of the premier players in the country, not just our team. But that has to be developed because he’s had a lot of time off from playing competitive basketball.”

Hopkins shared that he has dropped at least 10 pounds since his first day on campus, crediting the conditioning and vaunted player development program Pitino emphasizes for his svelte appearance.

“I feel like from the first day we stepped on campus, conditioning was a big part of what we were doing here,” Hopkins said as he slimmed down to 220 pounds from his old weight of 230-plus. “The long days that we had in the summer and the preseason, I feel like it’s helped me a lot. It’s the best shape I’ve been in. I feel more athletic and lighter.”

The fifth-year senior echoed Pitino’s desire to get more out of his proven star, the goal being a stronger work ethic.

“He definitely has mentioned getting an alpha mentality, a mamba mentality,” Hopkins reiterated. “That’s just me coming out, being aggressive from the jump and not taking a backseat to anybody.”

“He’s one of the best players in the country,” Mitchell said of his teammate. “We guard each other every day in practice, so we get each other better, we go at each other. We have a lot of fun. Bryce is a really good player, he’s real skilled. He can do a lot of things offensively and defensively, being able to switch and guard. He’s very strong. It’s hard to stop him when he’s at full momentum, but that just gets me better on the defensive end, having to guard him every day. Bryce is good. He’s gonna be elite for us.”

In his place to start Saturday’s prologue against Towson, the preseason CAA favorite, will be Mitchell, the Cincinnati transfer that has earned rave reviews from his new coach throughout the summer. When St. John’s held an open practice in August, Mitchell had been the team’s assist leader to that point, and his skill set has shown no dissipation thereafter.

“I like Dillon Mitchell, period,” Pitino gushed. “Starting, off the bench, I just like him as a player a lot. He’s just a selfless, really good basketball player that has the ability to be great.”

“He’s gonna push you every day,” Mitchell said of Pitino. “When I got here the first week, I would have thought we were playing in the Final Four next week. That’s just how (Pitino) is, that’s just the type of culture that is built here. Even some of the guys that returned from last year, they’ve preached it when I first got here.”

Pitino declined to etch a starting five in stone for the bulk of the season, citing the variables in opponents and personnel. Of greater significance is his commitment to a 10-man rotation, furthering the influx of depth the program saw in the offseason, even hinting it could be 11-deep once freshman guard Kelvin Odih returns to full health after a spate of injuries that cost him valuable practice time.

“I guess it’s unimportant because the starting lineup will change,” Pitino declared. “We may need a bigger starting lineup against Michigan (October 25), so that’s possibly where you’ll see Bryce and Dillon play together. I think it’ll depend on our opponent, defensively and matchups. But I’m very comfortable with ten players stepping up and playing.”