Rick Pitino Says COVID-19 Pandemic Helped Iona Recruit Eight-Man Class

Rick Pitino and his staff at Iona looked at the COVID-19 pandemic in a unique way.

Instead of thinking about all the problems and obstacles associated with the pandemic, which hit New Rochelle, N.Y. hard at the beginning, they wondered how they could make it work to their advantage.

“Positive people always say, look for the glass to be half full rather than half empty,” Pitino told Iona alum Vin Parise in a video chat this past weekend. “I always say, look for the glass to be half full and find a way to fill it up.

“So with me, COVID, we said, how can we use COVID as an ally? That’s a crazy thought. How could COVID be anything but terrible?”

Pitino, who took the Iona job back in May, then explained how the pandemic helped the Gaels land an eight-man recruiting class as he took over for former coach Tim Cluess, who stepped down due to health issues.

“We had to bring in eight players, this is a reconstruction project because we had to bring in 70 percent of the team,” he said. “If it wasn’t for COVID, we couldn’t have brought in the largest recruiting class in my history as a basketball coach…because if everybody was allowed to visit different places, we couldn’t get eight guys, one from Germany, one from Sweden, one from Rwanda, Nigeria, New York, North Carolina, Florida. They just had to make a decision. I think six out of the eight did not know where Iona was, what county or what state it was in. So COVID helped us in recruiting. And so not only did we look at the glass half full, we looked at filling it up right away.

“Now if had to bring in three or four guys, COVID would not have been a help. But when you have to bring in eight and guys don’t have a chance to visit five different schools, COVID helped us.”

To be clear, Iona’s eight new players are: freshman forward Dewayne Koroma (Germany), freshman guard Ryan Myers (Brooklyn, N.Y.), freshman guard Omar Rowe (Queens, N.Y.), freshman forward Johan Crafoord (Sweden), freshman forward Nelly Junior Joseph (Nigeria), sophomore guard Osborn Shema (Rwanda), junior guard Berrick JeanLouis (Florida) and sophomore guard Tahlik Chavez (Texas).

(As I reported this summer in The New York Times
NYT
, more and more Class of 2021 recruits are committing early during the pandemic because they can not take visits and have more time to discuss recruiting with their families. Iona currently has six Class of 2021 commits.)

A New York City native, Pitino said he was as excited to land the Iona job as he was when he got the Knicks job in the 1980s.

“I’m just as excited today because I get to finish my career back in my home town,” he said. “I think if Iona was in another place, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, even New Hampshire or Rhode Island, I would not have taken the job. But because it’s New York, and every single coach that has coached here…they all moved on, did great jobs, but the most important thing was how happy they were.”

He added that he plans to end his career at Iona “in a five-to-seven year span. So for me, it’s a great way to end my career and I’m very proud to be an Iona Gael.”

He also compared Iona to Providence, which he led to the 1987 Final Four.

“I’ve been to seven Final Fours, we won two championships [at Kentucky and Louisville], I’ve had a great run,” Pitino said. “But my favorite two years in all of basketball was Providence College, away from the lines.

“Small Catholic school, I could walk to practice, get to know the student body, get to know the professors, get to know the priests on campus. and in two years I had a magical run [with Billy Donovan]…

“And as I look back on my career, it’s not the championships that’s stick out, it’s those two years away from the lines. And I’m hoping Iona can be a replica of those two years.”

Pitino will open his Iona tenure at Fordham’s Rose Hill Gym on Nov. 25. The Gaels will also play three games at Mohegan Sun between Nov. 28-Dec. 2 before hosting Wagner Nov. 5. They open MAAC play Dec. 8 at Saint Peter’s.