With the Friars in search of their 17th head coach in program history we at The Providence Crier will take a look at the candidates who have been linked to the job.
While the leader in the clubhouse as of this writing is presumably Bryan Hodgson, with some combination of Herb Sendek, Jerrod Calhoun, and Eric Olen running in second, a name that hasn’t been discussed as frequently (but probably should be heavily in the mix) is Phil Martelli Jr.
We profile the former Bryant Bulldog in more detail below and why he should be a name PC fans get more familiar with.
Coaching Background
The current VCU coach and son of former St. Joe’s legend Phil Martelli, Martelli Jr. has only been a head coach for three years. He took over for fired coach Jared Grasso in 2023-2024 as interim and was named full time head coach for 2024-2025. In his first “full season” he won the America East regular season title, conference tournament, and was titled the Conference coach of the year. He was then hired to VCU the following year and has had immediate success this year, winning the A-10 regular season title and conference tournament. He currently has his 11 seed VCU team in the opening round.
Coaching Success
In his short tenure as head coach, all he does is win. He has a career .686 winning percentage and has won his conference’s regular season and conference tournament in both of his years as full time head coach. In his three years of being lead man, his teams have won 20, 23, and 27 games (more to come on that 27 number, potentially), respectively. That career winning percentage exceeds the winning percentage of Hodgson, Eric Olen, Jerrod Calhoun, and Herb Sendek, for what it is worth. He’s no slouch.
Why the Lack of Consideration?
If you want to poke holes into why he may not be considered as heavily as he should relative to some of the other names being floated, he’s a victim of being a head coach at programs that have had historical success in their respective conferences.
Bryant was in the midst of a historic run by Bryant standards under Grasso before he was terminated for his extracurricular activities. The detractors would say all Martelli Jr. had to do was keep the train on the tracks, which he did and then some. That’s easier said than done when a head coach is dismissed midseason, by the way, and I personally don’t think it’s fair to Martelli to hold that against him.
VCU has become the cradle of coaches for mid-major lead men making the jump to high major programs. Here are the list of coaches that preceded Martelli Jr.
Ryan Odom – Current Coach of UVA
Mike Rhoades – Current Coach of Penn State
Will Wade – Current Coach of NC State
Shaka Smart – Current Coach of Marquette
Anthony Grant – Current Coach of Dayton
Jeff Capel – Current Coach of Pittsburgh
There is something in the water in Richmond, Virginia, and Martelli Jr. is the next off the conveyor belt of high performing mid major coach about to get a promotion to a high major job. The success of the coaches before him is likely hurting him here, but, again, I don’t think that is fair to him. If you can coach, you can coach, regardless of where you are coaching. If anything, Martelli Jr. should be applauded for jumping to a job from Bryant where he knew he’d have continued success. If Martelli Jr. stays at VCU and has another 20 win season and post season birth next year, this argument falls by the wayside in my opinion.
People are banging the table more for Hodgson for a variety of reasons, but one of the primary reasons is because he turned around two struggling programs in Arkansas State and USF and made them a winner almost immediately. Martelli Jr. took on two jobs where they were already winning, so his success is a bit discredited.
Roster Construction
I spoke a lot about this in my Sendek article, and this point will be reiterated here. VCU is winning with a young team. 6 of the 8 top minutes guys on the current team all have eligibility heading into next year. Martelli Jr. could sell bringing over a core VCU team to Providence and augmenting with a few retained pieces from Providence. Martelli could hit the ground running with a hybrid VCU/Providence roster, and I think that selling point is very important.
Summary
One can probably read between the lines here, but I am probably higher on Martelli Jr. than the consensus and feel as if he should be taken seriously as a candidate for the Friar job. He has won everywhere he has been as a head coach and has made 2 NCAA tournaments in 2 years as full time head coach. He also has an incredible mentor in his father in Phil Martelli who had incredible success at a very similar school to PC in St. Joe’s. Who is to say that the elder Martelli wouldn’t serve as a de-facto advisor?
All that is to say I don’t know how seriously he is being considered, but I would applaud this hire if Nap were to throw a curveball and nab him as the next Friar head coach.