Kelvin Odih and Handje Tamba commit to St. John’s to round out next year’s roster

Rick Pitino added the final two scholarship players to next year’s roster this week, adding a highly-touted freshman and an under-the-radar center who began his career at Tennessee

Rick Pitino put the finishing touches on the 2025-26 St. John’s men’s basketball roster, landing the commitments of four-star high school recruit Kelvin Odih and Milligan (NAIA) transfer Handje Tamba earlier this week and filling in the team’s last two scholarship spots.

Ranked as the 75th-best recruit in the 2025 high school class by 247Sports, Odih announced his commitment to St. John’s on Wednesday afternoon. The Providence, Rhode Island native initially signed with West Virginia but de-committed after head coach Darian DeVries departed to take the Indiana job in March. Other programs such as Louisville, Maryland, and Utah, showed interest in Odih before he announced his commitment.

The 6-foot-4 standout guard will have his work cut out if he wants to crack a loaded guard rotation that boasts Ian Jackson, Oziyah Sellers, Joson Sanon, Dylan Darling, and Lefteris Liotopoulos, but Odih has the physical tools to leave an immediate impact in Rick Pitino’s brass-knuckles defensive system.

“Odih is imposing on the perimeter because of his strength, physicality, athleticism, and motor. He plays with an attacking mentality and extreme force on both ends of the floor,” Adam Finkelstein from 247Sports wrote in his scouting report of the standout from SoCal Academy.

Perhaps the most under-the-radar addition to next year’s team will be Handje Tamba. Hailing from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the 6-foot-11 center is using his final year of eligibility at St. John’s to bring some length and fill in the void left by Vince Iwuchukwu, who transferred to Big East rival Georgetown on Wednesday night.

Playing for Milligan University last season, an NAIA school located in Elizabethton, Tennessee, Tamba averaged 10.5 points, 8.9 rebounds, and 1.7 blocks per game, winning the 2024-25 Appalachian Conference Defensive Player of the Year award.

Prior to playing at Milligan, Tamba began his college career at Tennessee in the 2021-22 season, redshirting his freshman year before transferring to Weber State. In two seasons with the Wildcats, Tamba averaged 1.7 points, 1.5 rebounds, and shot 59 percent from the field in 56 games played and three starts.