College Basketball

Nickname debate no stranger to St. John’s

Twenty years ago, New York City was in the middle of its own “Redskins” debate. St. John’s, the area’s flagship college sports program, was feeling pressure to change its “Redmen” nickname because Native American groups felt it was a slur.

“It was a subject like it is now. It was in the headlines,” Kimberly Scheck Arezzi, the editor-in-chief at the time of The Torch, the school’s student newspaper, told The Post. “There was a lot of pressure of being politically correct, the start of politically correct conversations.”

The nickname “Redmen” was instituted in the 1920s because the men’s teams wore red uniforms. Over time it took on a Native American connection, in the form of a Native American headdress on the back of St. John’s jackets, as the team logo, and the mascot was a warrior-like Native American.

The mascot was first to go in 1991, and the name later went as well, changed to “Red Storm” in June 1994. A horse became the mascot, though it was changed to Johnny Thunderbird, a mythical bird, in 2009.

St. John’s declined to make the Rev. Donald Harrington, the university’s former president, former athletic director Jack Kaiser or former men’s basketball coach Lou Carnesecca, who headed up the committee to change the name, available for comment.

Sister Margaret Fitzpatrick, the senior vice president of St. John’s then, told The Torch in its Nov. 17, 1993 issue the committee for the nickname change was created “because of sensitivity to Native American Communities.”

“You can’t keep a nickname that increasingly more and more newspapers and radio stations won’t allow because it’s seen as offensive,” Harrington said in The Torch’s Dec. 8, 1993 issue. “In a lot of ways, the decision was made for us.”

Dave Wegrzyn, the school’s associate athletic director at the time, told The Post the administration felt it was the right thing to do for everyone involved. There wasn’t overwhelming pressure, he recalled, but with other universities changing their names, such as Stanford (Indians to the Cardinal) and Marquette (Warriors to Golden Eagles), St. John’s followed suit.

“I felt it was an important part of the University’s history, and time has shown it was a wise decision,” said Wegrzyn, now an associate vice president at Bryant University. “When you have part of the community that feel that it’s a derogatory nickname, it’s best to take a look and see if there’s an alternative that represents the University well. St. John’s University did that.”

There was opposition to the change at the school, with students and fans of the basketball program — even players — wanting to hold onto the “Redmen” name, Arezzi said. There were small protests when it was changed with minimal input from students.

“What it went back to was the students sided with history and connection to a team,” Arezzi said. “[There was] unhappiness. People were saddened by it. It was the end of an era.”

Two decades after the change, “Red Storm” has stuck. A recent poll conducted by the school indicated more than 75 percent of students, fans, faculty members and alumni are in favor of the name and want it to stay.

Looking back, Arezzi said it changed the way she felt about the school and the sports teams, but she also understood the reasoning behind it.

“I suppose if it makes people feel more inclusive towards our teams, that’s a great thing,” Arezzi said. “Nobody wants to feel ostracized or [be an] outcast.”