[2] The team has reached the NCAA tournament twenty-eight (28) times, boasts two John R. Wooden Award winners, 11 consensus All-Americans, 6 members of the College Basketball Hall of Fame, and has sent 59 players to the NBA.

[5] The 1910–11 St. John's team finished the season with a 14–0 record[6] and was retroactively named the national champion by the Helms Athletic Foundation and the Premo-Porretta Power Poll.

On January 19, 1931, the Wonder Five team was a part of the first college basketball triple-header at Madison Square Garden in a charity game which saw St. John's beat CCNY by a score 17–9.

Joe Lapchick, a former player of the Original Celtics, took over as head coach at St. John's in 1936 and continued the success the school had become used to under Buck Freeman.

The 1942–43 St. John's team were led by senior caption Andrew "Fuzzy" Levane and sophomore All-American center Harry Boykoff.

The Redmen's trademark defense and inside scoring presence of Boykoff led them past Rice, Fordham, and Toledo to claim the first of six NIT titles.

St. John's became the first team to repeat as champions in the seven-year history of the NIT even though World War II and the players' commitment to serve in the armed forces made it a very difficult season.

Despite the losses of their star players, the St. John's team managed to finish the season with an 18–5 record and a second NIT crown by defeating Adolph Rupp's Kentucky Wildcats and Ray Meyer's DePaul Blue Demons.

St. John's success continued the following year where they produced another 21–3 record, but their chance at a rematch with George Mikan's DePaul squad and a third consecutive NIT title was shattered with an upset loss to Bowling Green in the semifinals.

Lapchick was succeeded by Frank McGuire, a former player under Buck Freeman, who made the postseason four out of five years as the coach and had an overall record of 102–36, culminating in a second-place finish in the 1952 NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament.

However, school officials wanted a big-name coach to counter the rise of rival North Carolina State under Everett Case.

DeStefano's teams only made one postseason appearance and it was a 58–46 loss to the Seton Hall Pirates in the NIT Finals who were led by All-American center Walter Dukes.

One month after leaving his position with the New York Knicks, Lapchick resumed his head coaching duties where he started and put St. John's back on its winning path.

St. John's finished the 1958–59 season with an overall 20–6 record and captured its first ECAC Holiday Festival title with a 90–79 victory over St. Joseph's in the final and the school's third NIT championship by defeating top-seeded Bradley 76–70 in double overtime.

The starting five for the Redmen consisted of four seniors and sophomore sensation Tony Jackson who was named both the Holiday Festival and NIT Most Valuable Player during the 1958–59 season, setting a school record of 27 rebounds in one game.

At the end of the season senior captain Alan Seiden was rewarded with second team All-American honors and the Haggerty Award, given to the best collegiate player in the New York metropolitan area.

Upon Carnesecca's return, he continued to guide the program to 29 consecutive postseason tournament appearances and to playing in a major conference, the Big East.

* record stands after the 2023–24 season DeGray Gymnasium was the original home of the St. John's Redmen when the university was located at 75 Lewis Avenue in the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn, NY.

When the university was transitioning from Brooklyn to Queens, the basketball team split their home games between the old Madison Square Garden and Martin Van Buren High School for five seasons.

In 1961, home games were moved to the 5,602-seat Alumni Hall on the newly constructed Queens campus opening with a 79–65 win over George Washington University.

The current training facility of the St. John's basketball team is Taffner Field House, located on the Queens campus adjacent to Carnesecca Arena.