Rick Pitino Targets 900th Win vs Son Richard in Xavier Showdown

At present, St. John’s head coach rick Pitino is credited wiht 899 wins at the collegiate level. who’s the person standing in the way of No. 900? That would be his son, Richard Pitino, the head coach of St. John’s next opponent, the Xavier Musketeers.

“I think he [Richard Pitino] will do everything humanely possible to stop it,” Pitino joked after the Red Storm got a 65-60 win over the Seton hall Pirates on Tuesday night in his postgame press conference. “The amazing thing about it — I realy don’t think too much about number of wins — but the amazing thing to me when [special advisor] Kenny Klein told me about four games ago, he said ‘If you kept winning, you could have your 900th win against your son.’ I said, ‘What’s the chances of that happening, that you coach 900 games [over] 50 years and your 900th win is against your son?’ So, I think that’s a big treat for me and the family.

“Either way, we certainly know we’re going to have a difficult game against them [Xavier] as of their style of play. He’s a doing a fabulous job. This is going to be a lot of fun [and] a great game. If we lose, I’ll leave my team in Cincinnati.”

the father and son have faced off against each other as head coaches four times,with the elder Pitino 3-1 in the all-time matchups. Rick’s Louisville Cardinals got the best of Richard’s Florida International Panthers.