In Chris Mullin’s phone, one entry simply reads “Coach,” with no other name needed to identify Lou Carnesecca among the hundreds of other basketball contacts.
During Mullin’s introductory press conference Wednesday in the building named after his mentor, the school’s all-time leading scorer admitted it would be initially strange to be called the coach at St. John’s, a title he believes forever belongs to Carnesecca, a job Mullin’s never held anywhere before.
For former St. John’s players, it’s equally weird — and exciting.
“It makes me feel like old times, him being back here,” said Walter Berry, Mullin’s former teammate. “It’s gonna be hard [calling him coach], but we’ll all get used to it.”
Carnesecca said he never knew if Mullin would get into coaching, but hoped so, knowing his experience in the game was far more important than his inexperience on the sideline.
“I told him, if you were to sit and get a book and write down all the things that you know about basketball, it would fill volumes,” Carnesecca said. “Now he just has to get the guys to understand that. I mean, my mother could have coached him. He just had so much knowledge.
“I’m very proud of what he’s done and I know he can be very successful here. He’s gonna have a lot of people behind him.”
The 1,000-plus people in attendance — including family, friends, students, administration, alumni, media and former teammates — made it feel more like a homecoming than a press conference, with the returning hero receiving more praise than Dwight Eisenhower after World War II, Carnesecca quipped.
In the three decades since Mullin left campus, St. John’s has never achieved the same success, each team ultimately ending in the shadow of the school’s greatest team.
In 1999, St. John’s fell one game short of reaching the Final Four, the closest the team has gotten since Mullin’s senior season (1985). Though Mullin was in the NBA during that time, then-star Felipe Lopez said it was clear that Mullin never forgot about the school, often returning to work out with Red Storm players.
“He definitely unites the whole university, from the old school to the new generation,” Lopez said. “The one guy you continuously see or hear about is Chris Mullin.”
Seeing Mullin hold his old No. 20 jersey, on the court where he went from local legend to national star, Berry believes it’s only fitting for the player who led the Johnnies to their greatest days to be the reason for a renaissance.
“They’ve had a lot of ups and downs and they’ve been trying to come back and regroup and build this program,” Berry said. “They got back to the NCAA [Tournament] this year, which is great, and now Chris came in at the right time to take this team where they need to be — on top.”
