Louisville AD Josh Heird reaffirms he, Pat Kelsey want to schedule St. John's, Rick Pitino

Louisville and St. John’s will not be playing, unless in the postseason, this season, according to AD Josh Heird. The Cardinals and Red Storm are both wanting to make it happen, though, after discussions about last season and ahead of this one.

Heird shared the latest on a future matchup between Louisville and St. John’s, now coached by their former coach in Rick Pitino, in an appearance on ‘The Deener Show’ on Friday. He said that he, Pat Kelsey, and those at St. John’s have wanted and still want to set up that game. It’s just not going to work out again for the Cardinals this season after it didn’t work out for the Red Storm for last season.

“I would tell you. Pat wants to play that game. I want to play that game. It didn’t make sense for us to play that game this year,” Heird said. “We’re going to keep trying to figure it out. We had conversations last year. You know, we reached out last year and they said, ‘Nope, doesn’t fit into our schedule’. They reached out this year and doesn’t fit into our schedule. But, we – I’m hopeful that we can find a chance to play a home-and-home there.

“I think our fans would love it. Obviously, I think their fans would love it. I think it’s just a great opportunity for what looks to be two programs on the rise that are going to be really good for years to come. I can confirm it’s not going to happen ’25-’26 but we are motivated to try to get something done there.”

This has been a matchup that’s been hinted at since Louisville began its new tenure last offseason under Kelsey. Pitino most recently mentioned it while at the Final Four, while winning AP Co-National Coach of the Year.

The Red Storm are in negotiations with the Cardinals, as well as Kentucky, Michigan, and Iona, with three of those programs being ones that Pitino previously coached. Kentucky was able to get a game scheduled as they’ll be playing St. John’s as part of the CBS Sports Classic in December. However, for at least another year, Louisville vs. St. John’s won’t be on the slate for either team.

When you look at both programs, it makes sense why this isn’t working out right now. Louisville is already scheduled to play Kentucky, Tennessee and Indiana per reports. The Cardinals are also set to face a team in the SEC/ACC Challenge, and now, both Memphis and Cincinnati in their non-conference.

St. John’s is also adding opponents, with Kentucky added as well as being in The Player’s Era in Las Vegas. The Red Storm are also reportedly playing Alabama and Ole Miss in Madison Square Garden. That’s already a lot of quality games for both before either even gets to conference play in the ACC or Big East, respectively.

That’s a bummer of a scenario considering what a game this season would have been. Both teams are likely to open in ’25-’26 somewhere in the Top 10 to Top 15, considering the pair of portal classes they’ll each be bringing in. That’s after both teams spent the end of January on this last season as Top 25 teams and competed for, or won, conference championships before each took early exits from the 2025 NCAA Tournament.

It’s just obvious why these two scheduling a game against one another makes this much sense. Pitino was the head coach at Louisville for 16 seasons, the longest of any tenure in his career, from 2001 to 2017. He’s the second-most successful coach in program history with a record of 416-143 (.744), 10 conference titles across three leagues, and 13 appearances in the NCAA Tournament, leading to three Final Fours and one, albeit vacated, national title. That span didn’t end well off the court, but was a successful transition into the turn of the century after Denny Crum.

Louisville and St. John’s have not figured it out yet as far as scheduling each other. Still, when or if they do it prior to Pitino’s retirement, it’ll be one of the better non-conference matchups of that season with either the Cardinals coming up to New York City or Pitino making his return to the city of Louisville.