St. John’s junior guard Dylan Darling takes a shot at some March Madness Q&A with Post columnist Steve Serby.
Q: If coach Rick Pitino wasn’t a basketball coach, what job would have been suited for him?
A: Mob boss (laugh). I’m not really sure what I see Coach P doing besides coaching basketball.
Q: If you didn’t know how old he was, how old would you think he was?
A: Not 73. Probably 58, 60. I don’t even know how he’s able to do this at 73. My grandmother is 73, and I have no clue how he’s able to do this right now.
Q: What is the angriest you’ve ever seen Coach Pitino?
A: The angriest he’s ever been at me was probably Georgetown (laugh). He thought I was being a diva. He told me that privately about 20 times in a two-minute cycle (laugh). He’s a madman. Once you just stop reacting to everything with emotion with Coach P, I think you see that it’s all out of love, and he really just wants the best for you and the team … but yeah, he can be a madman.
Q: How did he think you were being a diva?
A: He didn’t like my attitude, he didn’t like my body language. And he was not shy on letting me know (laugh).
Q: When you watched the tape, did you see what he was talking about?
A: Yeah … yeah. I thought diva was a stretch (laugh), but yeah, I could see it.
Q: What was it about your body language?
A: I threw my hands up in the air once. He didn’t like that. He sees that as a sign of weakness.
Q: Why did you do that?
A: I thought the refs missed a call. He thinks basketball players should play basketball and let the refs ref (laugh), which is fair, and he would let me know to do that.
Q: What’s the best speech you’ve heard from him?
A: Definitely one of the ones in the summer where he was just talking about pushing through hard in the summer to achieve your goals in March. It’s kind of coming full circle now when you think about those.
Q: Has he shown clips or quotes from famous athletes or coaches?
A: We have a group chat with coach and he’ll send Kobe Bryant quotes and videos of Michael Jordan. He talks a lot about the Mamba Mentality and stuff like that.
Q: What would you tell recruits about what it’s like playing for Coach P?
A: If you love basketball, I think you’re gonna love Coach P. If you don’t love basketball, if you don’t love working out, you don’t love kind of being in the gym, this probably isn’t the spot for you. But if you love basketball and you really are striving, wanting to get better, I think this is the perfect spot for you.
Q: What makes him a Hall of Fame coach?
A: Just his attention to detail. His ability to hold guys accountable. And just how he sees the game. The game is just slowed down to him on the sideline. It’s crazy. He’s been doing it so long, he knows what you should do when. He just sees the game at a different speed than everybody else.
Q: What is the best joke he’s ever told?
A: Just the jokes he makes during film. He just has a lot of one-liners that are pretty funny (laugh).
Q: What was it like meeting Coach P for the first time?
A: Coach P put me through a workout, which was pretty intimidating. … Coach Pitino put me through a workout basically to see if I can play or not (laugh). I was just hopeful to shoot the ball well.
Q: What did he tell you after the workout?
A: That he wanted me to come here (laugh). So I figured I did well enough.
Q: What did you think of his white suit?
A: I loved it. I thought he was looking dapper. I thought he rocked it well.
Q: What have you learned about the Big East Conference?
A: It’s football. It’s a very physical league. It’s like playing football out there on a basketball court.
Q: What do you like best about your team?
A: We just have a bunch of dawgs. With the way the year started and how we weren’t really meeting expectations and there was a lot of noise, I feel like nobody ever wavered. We all had the utmost belief that we could still turn this around and turn it into what it is now.
Q: What do you expect the Garden to be like this week?
A: I’m not really sure what to expect. I was talking to a guy yesterday, and he said the Big East Tournament, it’s an energy that I haven’t experienced this year in the Garden, which is honestly hard for me to believe. The Garden has had great energy all year, so I’m excited to see what it’s all about.
Q: What kind of a boost does that give you?
A: A lot. It gives us life. It’s so much fun to be in and play in.
Q: What happened last time against UConn?
A: I just think they came out ready for us and we weren’t ready to play, and ultimately we kind of let our offensive struggles dictate our energy in how we were playing defense.
Q: Describe the rivalry with UConn.
A: It’s fun. Rivalries are fun. It’s good when it’s two of the best teams in the league playing for something. You got two of the best head coaches in college basketball, two of the best teams, two of the best venues in one of the best conferences. You can’t ask for much more.
Q: Would you like to play them for the Big East championship on Saturday night?
A: It would be fun to play them again.
Q: Whatever comes to mind: Zuby Ejiofor.
A: Dawg (laugh). Just what he does for us is out of this world. I don’t think we appreciate Zuby enough every game. Really down to earth. He’s not bigger than anybody. He’s always looking to help others.
Q: Bryce Hopkins.
A: When Bryce has the ball, I would like him to go try to score every single time ’cause, I mean, he can. Just a dominant bully driver, just a great all-around basketball player. Down to earth. Nothing’s too big for the guy. Funny.
Q Dillon Mitchell.
A: He’s the most athletic guy I’ve ever seen and/or played with. It’s really fun to watch him every day in practice. Just another guy who can really do it all out there.
Q: Ian Jackson.
A: He’s really just a world-class scorer. Guarding him every single day in practice has gotten me so much better. His scoring ability is next to none.
Q: Oziyah Sellers.
A: One of the best shooters I’ve ever played with. Great 3-and-D, can really do it all out there, too.
Q: Joson Sanon.
A: Probably one of the best pure scorers I’ve ever been around. Some days in practice, he won’t miss, and nobody can guard him.
Q: Lefteris Liotopoulos.
A: Just another great shooter.
Q: Ruben Prey.
A: He’s gonna be super, super, super good. He’s gonna be a beast next year.
Q: You like distributing the ball.
A: I just like winning. Whatever it takes to win, especially this time of year.
Q: Which nickname do you like better: Big Bells or Dilly Buckets?
A: (Laugh). Probably Dilly Buckets.
Q: Why?
A: Just ’cause I’ve had that the longest. I’m not too sure about Big Bells (laugh). I guess my grandma, she doesn’t like people talking about my (laugh) bells like that.
Q: But that’s a compliment.
A: I think it just makes her a little uncomfortable. She said that she has church bells hanging up on her wall back at home, she said she had to take those down (laugh).
Q: What enables you to be clutch?
A: That’s a good question. I honestly can’t put my fingers on it. I just think I’ve been in those situations before. I just feel like in those big moments, that’s kind of when your work comes in, like all the work that you put in leading up to it kind of comes to show in those big moments. I just feel like I trust my instincts and I just trust my work, and sometimes those big plays happen.
Q: You play better mad.
A: That’s true. I’m not sure why that is, honestly, but it is true.
Q: What gets you mad?
A: Really anything can tick me off. Maybe it’s the other team … maybe I get frustrated for some reason, or maybe it’s an opposing player talking trash or something like that. I don’t know, those things just normally seem to get me to tick and play better. I’m not sure why.
Q: Does the opposing crowd jeering you make you mad?
A: They don’t make me mad, I would say I do probably enjoy playing road games more than home games. I don’t know why but I like the feeling of going into somebody else’s place and kind of … taking their stuff (laugh).
Q: You’ve been described as a mini-Cam Skattebo.
A: (Laugh) I think it’s funny. I think that’s a fair comparison. … I think we just both play hard, both gritty dudes. Maybe don’t look the part, but I guess have a lot of heart to make up for it.
Q: Don’t look the part in what way?
A: I mean, I’m a 6-foot white boy playing in the Big East, playing at St. John’s. I’m not overly athletic, I’m not overly strong.
Q: How would you describe your mentality on the court?
A: I have to be a pest. I have to bother people. Everything that I lack in size and everything, I just know I gotta make up for in other ways. I think playing hard is kind of a skill. I just try to play harder than everybody. I try to be the hardest-playing dude out there. If there’s somebody out there playing harder than me, I try to match or even exceed it.
Q: You’ll be playing in March Madness for the first time.
A: I’m super excited. Grew up watching it as a kid. I think it’s the greatest sporting event there is.
Q: You had a hoop in your living room?
A: It was a 10-foot hoop.
Q: How much of a help was that?
A: A lot (laugh). A lot. I used to be on that thing all day long.
Q: Did you do any damage in the house?
A: I did. Our TV color couldn’t go on just from the basketball hitting it all the time (laugh). A lot of plates, our kitchen was not too far, basketball’s bouncing, plates, glasses, you name it.
Q: Why did your mother put up with that?
A: She didn’t. That was more my father. My parents got divorced, so I should say after the divorce is when the basketball hoop in the living room got to stick. ’Cause when my mom was still in the house, the basketball hoop was out in the driveway (laugh). I asked him to put the hoop in.
Q: Did you play 1-on-1 with him?
A: All the time.
Q: What was that like?
A: It was good. We had a lot of battles growing up (laugh). We still joke about it to this day.
Q: How bad was your back injury physically and emotionally your sophomore year at Washington State?
A: Physically, I would say I was only able to get about to 60 percent. I was only able to move at like 60 percent speed. And I would say it was probably a lot harder mentally, just being away from the game. You kind of take it for granted until it gets taken from you, so sitting out the whole year was probably harder on me mentally.
Q: Were you concerned about your basketball future?
A: For the injury-wise, no, just because the doctor had told me with PT [physical therapy] and everything, everything was gonna be alright in the long run. I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with basketball after my sophomore year just ’cause I felt like my love for the game was kind of fading a little bit.
Q: Was that the biggest adversity you had to overcome?
A: I would just say probably my whole Washington State experience. My freshman year wasn’t good at all. I had a lot of bad habits that I needed to break. I wasn’t living right, probably. I kind of went into Washington State thinking that I was pretty good from high school. I wasn’t carrying myself how I should have. I wasn’t locked in like I should have been, like I guess a Division I athlete should be, on the court, off the court, academically, really in any way. Pullman wasn’t a great place for me, then my sophomore year the back happened, basketball got taken away. I was just kind of in a bad spot physically and mentally. I didn’t know what I wanted to do after my coach left for Stanford. I wasn’t able to stay at Washington State with the new coaching staff coming in. It was really just Idaho State for me. It was the biggest blessing I could have ever got.
Q: You broke your hand twice playing football.
A: My eighth grade year going into high school I was playing football, ended up missing basketball season. I think it was like the day or two before I was supposed to get one of the casts off I broke the other one. I honestly don’t remember much — I do remember being in two casts at the same time, though.
Q: You won’t have surgery on your left pinky finger?
A: My pinky finger is pretty cooked. Basically, it happened last year at Idaho State. I dislocated it the very first game of the year. … I went in at the very end of the year to go kind of get it checked out, and they had said I broke it. I just tape it every day so it doesn’t go out of place. I guess when I broke it, it was probably late January or early February, and they were saying that was a break and that it actually healed decently. If I wanted surgery I would have to be out for three months or I could kind of just live with it like this and tape it. I was kind of, “I’ll just go with a crooked pinky.”
Q: Did Coach P ask about it when you met him for the first time?
A: No. I don’t even think Coach P knows.
Q: Even now?
A: No.
Q: Does it hinder you in any way?
A: I can’t bend it very much. But I can do everything with it, there’s not much pain. If I didn’t have this tape on, I wouldn’t be able to play without it.
Q: Your mother told you a story about your T-ball the other day.
A: My dad [James Darling] played in the NFL and I guess when I was young I would go to those games, and she was telling me a story about how when she came to the game the other day, you know, the starting intros and everything, the fire flashing, everything, she was telling me that I was very upset that my T-ball game didn’t have the intros with the fire going. So I guess it was kind of funny in a full-circle moment, and now she’s coming to my games and there’s fire and everything going (laugh).
Q: Who were your favorite players growing up?
A: LeBron [James] and Kyrie [Irving] were always two that I loved watching. … Kevin Durant … Carmelo [Anthony].
Q: Describe your 58-point game against North Central [Wash.] HS.
A: It was funny, I got the COVID shot the day before that game, and my shoulder — I got it in my right shoulder ’cause I’m a lefty — but my shoulder was ***** killing ***** me the whole day. I even remember telling my coach, I was like, “Coach, my shoulder is ***** killing ***** me like right before tipoff and then basically that happened, so … got a lot of buckets (laugh).
Q: What is your favorite thing about New York?
A: I would say the energy … never being bored. I like how you can go downtown and there’s people in suits, there’s homeless people banging on drums, there’s people selling food all on the same block, and everybody’s just kind of minding their own business and going about their day.
Q: Three dinner guests?
A: LeBron, Matthew McConaughey, Kevin Hart.
Q: Favorite movie?
A: “The Pursuit of Happyness.”
Q: Favorite actor?
A: Denzel Washington.
Q: Favorite actress?
A: Megan Fox.
Q: Favorite entertainer?
A: Drake.
Q: Favorite meal?
A: Chicken alfredo.
Q: Why do you wear No. 0?
A: I would have been No. 1 but Dillon Mitchell beat me to it. So 1, 2, 3 were all taken, so I settled for 0.
Q: What drives you?
A: My support system. I have one of the best support systems in the world in my parents, in my family, my friends. Them cheering me on from when I was young all the way up until high school, all the way up into me not playing at Washington State, to be my biggest fans at Idaho State, to them being able to watch me kind of on this stage, kind of just gives me life … and just them never wavering and never batting an eye, just being my biggest fans, it kind of just makes me work that much harder and try to be the best for them.
Q: What would be your dream March?
A: My dream March would, of course, be going all the way or making a deep run.
Q: What is your message to St. John’s fans?
A: Thank you for all the support they’ve given us this year, from filling up Carnesecca [Arena] to filling up the [Garden], to just showing love wherever we’re at and what we’re doing. … We’re gonna die trying to make this run.