St. John's basketball to play in $1 million NIL event during 2025 season

While anticipation is building for the upcoming St. John's basketball season, the hype surrounding its 2025-26 non-conference schedule is building.

The Johnnies will be starting a home-and-home series with Kentucky in Lexington and now there will likely be three games on the schedule during Thanksgiving week in Las Vegas as the Red Storm will participate in the newly created $1 million NIL Tournament.

The event begins this season with a field that consists of Rutgers, Notre Dame, San Diego State, Alabama, Creighton, Texas A&M, Houston, and Oregon. It's likely that those team will remain in the event next season while St. John's, Gonzaga, Michigan, Syracuse, and Saint Joseph's are added, according to multiple reports.

The 'Players Era Festival' is looking to fill its event for 18-teams in the 2025-26 season while Duke, Kansas, and Virginia are also rumored to be teams in the tournament.

Each team that participates gets a guaranteed $1 million for its NIL collective that is to be distributed among its players while there are other opportunities to earn money through appearances, individual success, and team success.

St. John's was rumored to be joining the initial field of the event but focused its attention to its other multi-team events before joining the tournament a year from now.

This season, St. John's will be playing in the Baha Mar Hoops Challenge with a field of Tennessee, Baylor, and Virginia while adding another non-conference game against Georgia in Atlantis during its week in Paradise Island.

The Johnnies will also be hosting Kansas State in the final Big East vs. Big 12 Challenge as well as matchup against New Mexico and Richard Pitino, Rick Pitino's son.

St. John's, after missing out on the NCAA Tournament last season, will be looking to return to the postseason for the first time since 2019 in its second season under Rick Pitino.