St. John's basketball and Rick Pitino witnessed history on Wednesday against UConn, but not the good kind. The Red Storm's 13-game winning streak snapped in embarrassing fashion with a 72-40 defeat. It's officially the most lopsided loss in the St. John's-UConn series.
And Pitino took his frustration out on the postgame press conference as detailed by Matt Norlander on CBS Sports.
“Rick Pitino spoke to the media for one minute and 15 seconds, chose not to go to the press conference, took ownership for the loss and then turned around and went back to the locker room. Awaiting to hear from Zuby Ejiofor, hopefully,” Norlander posted on the social media website X, formerly Twitter.
Pitino ranted with a “it's all on me” statement, but also walked away after saying “I'll make my corrections and move on.”
Rick Pitino full post game after 72-40 loss to UConn in Hartford: "It's all on me, very disappointed in our performance, offensively especially" pic.twitter.com/tytfBheNYB
— Storrs Central (@StorrsCentral) February 26, 2026
Ejiofor did indeed talk…bloody lip and all.
Zuby Ejiofor got treated for a bloody lip but give a small media gaggle about five minutes on what he said was a loss he didn’t expect whatsoever and was the worst he ever experienced.
Column coming later. pic.twitter.com/yNCo9DhzBD
— Matt Norlander (@MattNorlander) February 26, 2026
The atmosphere was far different for UConn and Dan Hurley, though.
UConn embraces crowd energy in St. John's rout
The national champion winning head coach began with these words:
“Not much for me to complain about,” he said via UConn beat writer Joe Arruda of the Hartford Courant.
Dan Hurley’s opening statement: “Not much for me to complain about.”
Said Reed’s performance was as good as a center’s ever had for him. “Pain (of Creighton loss) changes people.” pic.twitter.com/kwg3SoPcnL
— Joe Arruda (@joearruda9) February 26, 2026
But he shared stronger words during a timeout — which got captured by the UConn Huskies report.
“Don't give them life. Beat their a–,” he's overheard saying in the huddle.
It's not the first time in the last five days that Hurley dropped a profanity — as he delivered the F-bomb in a Saturday postgame presser. UConn's head coach got to redeem himself, though, after what he called a mistake in managing his bench. Hurley added how he loved hearing the crowd energy at the Storrs, Ct. venue that clearly rattled the Red Storm players.
Pitino rarely takes a 32-point loss regardless of where he coached. But now he and the Red Storm must recover quick after shooting a dismal 19.6% from field goal range and taking an embarrassing loss.
