St. John's is No. 2 seed in West Region at 2025 NCAA Tournament
NEW YORK (WABC) -- St. John's University will be the No. 2 seed in the West Region at the NCAA Tournament. They will face Omaha in the round of 64 on Thursday in Providence, Rhode Island.
ESPN: See the full Men's NCAA Tournament Bracket 2024-25
The Johnnies took down Creighton in the Big East Championship on Saturday to earn their automatic bid. It was the first Big East title for the Red Storm in 25 years.
Rick Pitino also became the first coach to win a conference championship with five different schools.
The Auburn Tigers, led by SEC player of the year Johni Broome, were chosen as the No. 1 overall seed for the NCAA tournament on Sunday, with conference champions Duke (ACC), Houston (Big 12) and Florida (SEC) also tabbed as 1-seeds by the selection committee.
The NCAA selection committee favored Auburn, which won the SEC regular-season title, despite three losses in their last four games as well as a loss to Duke in the lone meeting between the teams.
The SEC made NCAA tournament history with 14 representatives among the 68 teams to make the field. The highest prior mark was the Big East's 11 bids in 2011.
In something of a surprise, both North Carolina (22-13) and Texas (19-15) slid in off the bubble, while Indiana, West Virginia and Boise State did not.
Auburn (28-5) will be the top seed in the South Region and will face the Alabama State-St. Francis winner in Thursday's first round in Lexington, Kentucky.
The Tigers faltered down the stretch, including a 70-65 defeat to Tennessee in the semifinals of the SEC tournament on Saturday.
St. John's made 14 straight shots from the field in the second half to beat Creighton 82-66 on Saturday night for its first Big East Tournament title in 25 years.
The win earned the conference's automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament for their first trip since 2019, making the 72-year-old Rick Pitino the first coach to take six schools to the Big Dance.
"Great win for the city. Great win for our university. You hear it all along that it's New York's team, and it truly is," the Hall of Fame coach said. "As a New Yorker myself, I'm very, very proud that St. John's has gotten to this level."
Pitino, in his second season with the Johnnies, also became the first coach to win the Big East Tournament at two schools. He's won three times in his last four seasons in the league, after guiding Louisville to championships in 2009, 2012 and 2013.
St. John's had been mired in mediocrity, earning trips to the NCAA Tournament every four or five years before exiting early.
Pitino, the master of rebuilds, turned the Johnnies around in typical fashion.
Fresh off an NCAA Tournament bid at Iona, Pitino led St. John's to 20 wins last season and upped the ante with a 30-win season this year that earned the Red Storm (30-4) the No. 2 seed in the West Region.
"Coach P is the mastermind behind all of this," St. John's swingman RJ Lewis Jr. said after the Red Storm's 82-66 win over Creighton in the Big East title game. "I mean, it's truly special."
And not surprising.
Pitino has worked magic at every stop of a career that started in Hawaii in 1975 leading Boston University, Providence, Kentucky, Louisville, Iona, and now St. John's to the tournament.
If St. John's beats No. 15 seed Omaha, the Red Storm would face a potential matchup against No. 7 Kansas and coach Bill Self or John Calipari's No. 10 Arkansas Razorbacks.
The 68-team bracket starts whittling down on Tuesday with the First Four games, and the main draw kicks off Thursday and Friday, with 32 games at eight sites around the country.
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Some information from ESPN and the Associated Press
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