A thief’s sword, bullhorn, from St. John’s coach Rick Pitino

NEW YORK — Two thieves took a ceremonial sword and a bullhorn from St. John’s basketball coach Rick Pitino’s office, a spokesman for the Catholic institution in the New York City Borough of Queens said Thursday.

Brian Brown said the theft happened just before 8 Tuesday night at the athletic department office, which is located on the hardwood floor at Carnesecca Arena, where the Red Storm play.

He said the police investigation is ongoing, and it was not immediately clear whether other items were stolen from the Hall of Fame coach’s office or other parts of the building.

Pitino initially posted on social media that he was “really upset” that even an expensive bottle of wine was missing from his office, but later posted that he was just joking.

Police said in a statement that the two men somehow entered “without authorization” and removed several items before fleeing on a moped westbound on Union Turnpike.

The department declined to elaborate. But it also released surveillance footage Thursday of two men walking down a hallway in the building, one holding a stolen sword and the other a bullhorn.

Born in New York and raised on Long Island, Pitino was hired by St. John’s last year in hopes of restoring a storied Big East program that had its heyday in the 1980s but has sunk into mediocrity for more than two decades.

The Hall of Fame coach won NCAA championships at Kentucky in 1996 and Louisville in 2013, but the title was vacated at Louisville for NCAA violations.

Another NCAA case related to the FBI’s investigation into corruption in college basketball recruiting led to Pitino being fired by Louisville in 2017, although the NCAA eventually exonerated Pitino.

Before coming to St. John’s, the 71-year-old coached for three seasons at Iona, just north of New York City.

Pitino has also been the head coach of the New York Knicks and Boston Celtics, Boston University, Providence College and Panathinaikos, a professional team in Athens.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.