Carson Crawford, a 2027 wing from Florida, has set up a fall visit with Providence for October 19th. The product from Fleming Island high school, adjacent to Jacksonville, is a 4 star wing. 247 has him as 69th overall, while the 247 Composite has him ranked slightly better at 54th overall.
Crawford will be pursued by a plethora of ACC and SEC schools. Providence is currently competing with the likes of Florida State, Georgia, and Ole Miss, and I’m certain other southeastern schools will jump into the mix for the Top 75 wing.
The hunt for the next lead guard for Providence is on, with Hodgson and Staff offering a plethora of lead guards in the 2027 and 2028 class. One lead guard, Canadian Javion Tyndale, has set up a visit to Providence in late August to see the campus.
We profile his game, skillset, and recruitment below.
Coach Bryan Hodgson has seemingly put the finishing touches on his Providence roster for 2026-2027, and he is aiming to begin building out his 2027 high school recruiting class. Gabe Nesmith, a five star wing playing for Overtime Elite, is taking a visit to Friartown today. The 18th overall player in his class, Nesmith was teammates with current Friar Clyde Walters at OTE.
Nesmith is being courted by a slew of schools geographically located in the southeast. Nesmith has taken visits to Vanderbilt, Kansas, and Louisville already and already holds offers from Auburn and Florida State, amongst others. I mentioned in the 2027 Recruiting Primer (linked below) that we shouldn’t be surprised to see Providence target kids in SEC-country. Hodgson and staff have spent most of their time coaching in the Southeast, so the majority of their relationships should be embedded in that region.
I long complained about Cooley wasting his time in the Carolinas recruiting, as that is clearly ACC territory, but with the emergence of NIL, recruiting and geographic allegiances have become secondary to financial commitments made by schools.
Nesmith is every bit of his measured 6’5 frame. If anything, he appears to play a bit longer and taller than the listed 6’5. He grew up playing point guard, and you can see that with his handle.
Offensively, he can knock down the deep ball and has a smooth mid-range game. His length allows him to finish at and above the rim, and I particularly like that he has a floater in his arsenal when he gets into the paint. He is a true three level scorer.
At the risk of inflating his stock to unfair levels, I do see shades of Dybanasta in his game in that he is a big bodied wing that can manipulate the defense to get to where he wants on the court on offense. He’s methodical in his approach to offense.
Nesmith plays for the prestigious Nightrydas Elite AAU Team. That club has some pretty famous alums: Boozer twins, Caleb Wilson, and Scottie Barnes, to name a few. If you can play for this squad, chances are you are going to be playing high level college basketball. Nesmith is playing alongside a slew of elite recruits on this AAU team. One the Friars should be familiar with is big man Lewis Uvwo, who the Friars have offered.
Having a familiar face in Clyde Walters on the Providence roster will be beneficial in this recruitment, but I get the sense this recruitment has a few more chapters in it. Nesmith has blown up on the AAU scene and in select invite camps, like the NBPA Top 100 camp. Hodgson getting him to visit merely two weeks after an offer is a good start, and a successful season in Providence will bolster the chances for the Friars to score an upset on the recruiting trail by landing Nesmith.
Success this season by Dink Pate, Devin Vanterpool, and Ryan Mela will help Hodgson sell the vision on how he can develop wings at the collegiate level. I do think the scoring guards and wings are the strength of this 2026-2027 roster for Providence, and they will be showcased in a positive light.
Stay tuned in to The Providence Crier for updates on 2027 and 2028 recruiting, as well as all things Providence Friar basketball.
We are entering peak offseason time where news about the Providence Friars will be sparse. We’ll keep everybody up to date as we hear things about the new staff, new players, and outlook on the 2026-2027 season.
With that said, we’ll take this slower news cycle to analyze certain aspects of college sports that are changing and how it’ll impact the Providence Friars and college sports in general.
Our first topic will be the introduction of multi-year NIL agreements. We detail below.
With Providence seemingly having a complete roster, sans a few late summer additions that will serve as presumably rounding out the bottom of the roster for depth purposes, the Friars have in essence built out their team for the 2026-2027 season. What do we think?
At The Providence Crier, we have written up individual player previews and impact analyses on each of the players. Take a look at those articles if you want a deep dive on each player and what they’ll bring to the 2026-2027 Friars.
Below, I take a holistic look at the roster and analyze the perceived strengths, potential weaknesses, and current unknowns as we head into the dog days of Summer. Let me know what you think, where you agree with me, and where you may differ in opinion.
At The Providence Crier, we take pride in keeping the readers up to date on all things high school and portal recruiting. With the hiring of Bryan Hodgson, I was thinking about editing our last version of the 2027 Recruiting Primer that we put together while Kim English was at the helm, but the offers have been so drastically different from one regime to the next that we figured we’d start fresh with a new 2027 Recruiting Primer.
This is Version 2.0 of the Providence 2027 Recruiting Primer. Since our initial draft, we’ve added a 2027 recruit in Clyde Walters that reclassified to the 2026 class and is currently enrolled at Providence on a two year NIL contract.
More important, the 5 for 5 ruling passed so all of the 4th year “true” seniors on the roster, of which there are a plenty, will have another year of eligibility. This is vital because there are currently 4 players that have now been gifted an extra year that we thought had to be replaced after this season. Two of them, Samson Aletan and Arrinten Page, man our frontcourt, while the other two in Malik Mack and Ryan Sabol are in contention to run the show at lead guard. If this ruling didn’t pass, I was expecting the staff to add likely 3-4 players at the 1 and 5 positions exclusively via high school recruiting and the transfer portal, so this ruling is certainly a windfall for Providence in that roster continuity can legitimately be a real thing next year.
This is all to say that there are not any glaring needs in the 2027 class given this rule change, but I do have a gut feeling on the positions Hodgson is going to prioritize.
If you want to take a look at the previous 2027 Recruiting Primer under Kim English, feel free below. I’m certain there will be names offered by the prior staff that also get offers from Hodgson.
Mike and I will be updating this daily as news comes in with new offers, visits being set, etc.
Below, we’ll list the 2027 recruits with offers, and I also added a section of players I think should be offered by the Providence staff for a multitude of different reasons.
We have talked the past few days about two remaining needs for the 2026-2027 Friars before we deem the roster complete and no longer lacking any holes. One of those pressing needs was a lead guard to complement ascending talent Gavin Hightower. Providence has checked the box on one of those needs with the transfer commitment of Georgetown point guard Malik Mack.
Mack may have been playing on a basement dweller in Georgetown the past two years, but who are we to judge? The past two years for Providence have been abysmal, so I think it’s fair to wipe the slate clean for Mack and Georgetown and objectively analyze how he performed at the Big East level the last two years.
We go into detail on his game, what he does well, what he needs to improve on, and what he’ll bring to Providence.
NEWS: Georgetown transfer guard Malik Mack has committed to Providence, a source told @On3.
The roster is starting to crystallize for the 2026-2027 season for the Providence Friars. Last night’s commitment of Northwestern big man Arrinten Page gives Providence a nice 1-2 punch at the 5 position with Page and Yale transfer big Samson Aletan.
Page’s commitment is a massive win for the Friars. His career has been up and down, but when the motor is on and engine is running consistently, he’s has shades of an NBA big. I found myself wondering why he wasn’t more of a wanted commodity and known name this portal cycle, and I have to think it was because of the following:
1. Northwestern’s lack of success
2. His hot/cold streak. One game he looks like an NBA big. Another game he is a no-show.
3. This being his first year in three years of college producing.
Whatever the case, Providence is looking to build off Page’s breakout junior season at Northwestern.
He has untapped potential that many big men do not possess. He has the tools, and you hope Hodgson and staff can turn that potential into consistent production.
Arrinten Page would a good get for Providence.
Not totally sure what happened at NW this year, but he showed some awesome flashes in the beginning of the year.
Has some real passing stuff + is a physical beast.
We break down the commitment below and project Page’s roster fit for 2026-2027.
Arrinten Page becomes the 6th player added to the Friars via the portal. We will have a commitment article out at some point tomorrow but until then check out the preview article we wrote earlier this week ICYMI.
Providence is on a heater with landing several commitments over the past week, and PC is looking to close on Northwestern lead guard Jayden Reid as the next Shark sighting.
Hodgson and Staff have done an elite job of building out their wing with additions of Byrd, Vanterpool, Sabol, and Pate, while retaining Mela, and they yesterday added their first frontcourt player in Yale center Samson Aletan. I’d look to see Providence add another true center to the roster and a utility frontcourt player like a Jerald Colonel to have three game ready bodies in the frontcourt.
Now, the glaring gap in the roster is a true point guard. Gavin Hightower was a fantastic addition, as I think he’s going to be a first off the bench guard, but it would be a lot to ask a true sophomore who only played 10 minutes a game last year in the American to come in and run the show for a Big East squad. Hodgson needs to add a veteran lead guard to run point for this roster, and Jayden Reid just may be the guy.
NEWS: Memphis is involved with Northwestern G Jayden Reid (@jaydenreid0), source confirms to me.
Auburn, VCU, Kansas State, Texas A&M + others are also reportedly involved. Averaged 10.1 PPG and 5 AST on 39/32/82 splits.
Coach Bryan Hodgson is on a recruiting tear this offseason, flexing his recruiting chops in a way that even the most bullish of Providence fans wouldn’t expect. After retaining do-everything wing Ryan Mela and landing defensive weapon Myles Bird and G-League star Dink Pate, Hodgson and staff added another high level portal player into the wing rotation.
We did an in-depth player preview on Vanterpool below, and we’ll take the time to reflect on how Vanterpool will mesh with the current Providence players on the 2026-2027 roster.
Providence is on the hunt for frontcourt replacements, and Aletan has been added to the list of potential next Friars. The 6’10 225lb Samson Aletan from Dallas, Texas was reported to have been on campus on Monday as Coach Hodgson is looking to add bodies to the 4/5 position.
Yale forward Samson Aletan recently completed a visit to Providence, per source.
Providence is looking to replenish the frontcourt after the graduation of Cole Hargrove, departure of Oswin Erhunmwunse to Creighton, and presumed transfer of Peteris Pinnis. Hodgson is likely going to have to nab 3 frontcourt bodies to fill out the 4/5 position on the roster, and word has come that there is a Zoom meeting being set up with SFA frontcourt player Jerald Colonel early this week.
NEWS: SF Austin’s Jerald Colonel is entering the transfer portal, his agent Larry Hall of @HOFSportsGroup told @LeagueRDY.
The 6-foot-9 big man out of Savannah, Georgia was named the Southland Conference Defensive Player of the Year this season.
