After No. 9 St. John’s seized a two-game lead on Creighton atop the Big East Conference with a 79-73 victory before a sellout crowd of 19,812 at Madison Square Garden, McDermott was asked if he was surprised that senior guard Deivon Smith played in the game considering that Pitino had ruled him out on Friday.

Steve Masiello is associate head coach at St. John's, so maybe he's a little biased, but he'll eagerly make the case that his boss, Rick Pitino, is the best there ever was in this game.

Smith looked the best he has since bruising his right shoulder in a Jan. 11 win over Villanova. Since then, he missed four games and didn’t look like himself when he was on the floor, hesitant to shoot and favoring his right shoulder. But in 26 impactful minutes on Sunday, he had eight points and three steals and showed no hint of an injury.