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.
Jay Larrañaga should be a familiar name in Friartown. He is the son of Friar alumn Jim Larrañaga and those PC fans who also root for the Boston Celtics will also know he was an assistant with the NBA franchise from 2012-2021.
Continue reading “Friars Coaching Candidate Profile: Jay Larrañaga”It’s amazing how a few days can drastically change a season for a college basketball team. The Friars entered Wednesday with a chance to win out and get a 5-seed and a first round bye in the Big East. Instead they got blown out at the hands of Marquette and then it gets reported that head coach Kim English will be fired at season’s end.
Now the Friars will finish a trying regular season against a Georgetown squad that has also had their share of failures. The Hoyas have lost KJ Lewis to injury, dropped seven straight games, and can do no better than 10th in the final league standings. If the reports are true that Kim English is fired, we can look back at the first meeting with the Hoyas earlier this year as the straw that broke the camel’s back. The Friars blew a 21-point lead and saw Ed Cooley get his first win at the AMP as an opposing coach. From there, it seemed the Kim English departure was a matter of when, not if.
For the Friar fanbase, this is an interesting watch. There isn’t anything to play for besides seeding, but Friar fans will inevitably tune in to see how English coaches this team with his fate already sealed. Will the team sleepwalk through this one like they did Marquette or will the firing galvanize the Friars to rally around their coach? That’s what we’re most looking forward to seeing.
We preview the game in more detail below.
Continue reading “Friars Travel to DC for Season Finale”It’s been a trying season for the Friars with so many close losses but they’re starting to turn a corner during the most important stretch of the season. PC went to Omaha and defeated the Creighton Blue Jays for the first time since January 20th, 2021. With the victory the Friars have won 3 in a row for the first time since defeating Brown back in December and it’s their first 3-game win streak in the Big East since February of 2024. The Friars are also now winners of five of seven and are in 7th in the Big East with a chance to climb as high as 4th. Jaylin Sellers once again led the way for the Friars with his second consecutive game of 27 points and scored a critical hoop late that put PC up 3 with 15 seconds left.
We break down the game in more detail below.
Continue reading “They’re Letting the Friars Get Hot: Sellers Helps Lead Friars to 79-76 Victory over Creighton”They may have been missing five players but that didn’t stop the Friars from enacting some revenge on the Xavier Musketeers Wednesday night at the AMP.
After the game was pushed back an extra day due to the Blizzard of 2026, the Friars came out from the jump and blasted the Musketeers building a 23-point lead during the first half. The scrappy Xavier bunch under their first-year coach Richard Pitino punched back and only found themselves down 13 at half and cut it to as many 7 points, but the Friars offense led by transfers Jason Edwards and Jaylin Sellers were too much for them to handle. The Friars got contributions up and down the limited roster as Jamier Jones also poured in 19 points, Oswin had a double-double and even Nilivan Daniels hit a three in his first career start.
Their offensive attack beat Xavier off the bounce throughout leading them to shoot 54% from the floor and it opened up the long ball as PC went 9/18 on threes in this one. PC also brought the defensive intensity early albeit they let go of the rope in that department with Xavier going for 50 points in the second half. In the end, PC made enough stops to win.
We recap the game in more detail below.
Continue reading “Sellers, Edwards Shine as Providence Defeats Xavier 94-84”The Friars faced adversity before even stepping onto the Wintrust Arena court on Saturday night. The Friars’ flight to Chicago Friday night had them stuck on the tarmac for 6 hours before being sent home for the night. An additional 4 hour delay Saturday morning followed. PC eventually did make it to Chicago and their flight home should be much more enjoyable than their travel there. PC rallied in the second half to build a lead and then survived late game errors they seem to consistently make all season before hanging on for a 71-68 victory. With the win the Friars improve to 12-15 and 5-11 in the Big East conference.
Continue reading “Friars Battle Travel Delays and Late Game Demons to Defeat DePaul 71-68”The Friars entered Wednesday night’s game against Seton Hall with a chance to have their first three-game winning streak since December 9th and their first streak of three wins in the Big East since February 21st, 2024. The Friars got off to a great start with sizzling three-point shooting and found themselves leading for the majority of the game’s first 28 minutes of play. That, however, would change as Seton Hall grabbed their first lead of the game with 12:15 left to play and didn’t look back as they defeated the Friars 87-80 in Newark.
For the Pirates it was the most points they’ve scored all season long. For the Friars it was the same story all season, allowing an opponent to score at will with no defensive resistance.
With the loss the Friars fall to 11-14 on the season and 4-10 in the Big East, tied with Marquette for last place in the conference. While the Friars offense put up 80 points in this one, they also did their defense no favors by committing 18 turnovers, which led to 17 easy points for the Pirates. It has been the same story all season.
History was made at Amica Mutual Pavilion on Wednesday night, and no it wasn’t the Friars allowing an opposing player to get their career high. Well, Finley Bizjack did actually tie his career high but that’s beside the point…
It was the first time in the history of the Big East that two games between conference foes went to double overtime in one season. This time it was the Friars getting revenge for their 110-113 loss in 2OT at Hinkle Fieldhouse back on December 13th with a 97-87 2OT in at the AMP. It was truly a gritty performance for the Friars, who were missing five players going into the game, had Stefan Vaaks leave the game with injury, and had Oswin and Jamier Jones foul out. In a season full of close loses, including four in overtime, the Friars executed down the stretch and made the plays to win the game.
How about that Nilavan Daniels three ball?!
So the Crier is back on the mountain, this time in Vermont with pals from high school. BOC was so disgusted with the performance he called it quits early, turned the game off with about 8 minutes remaining, and asked for the Crier to create a skeleton version of a postgame recap.
The Friars made my job easy because they played like a bag of bones against Villanova on Friday night at the Finn. We all thought the “bottom drops out game” would come on the road against Connecticut. To the Friar’s credit they played well in Storrs but saved their stinker for Villanova.
PC got blitzed from the jump and showed all their weaknesses against Nova in the first half. A team that has shown all year they can’t defend the 3, have poor transition defense and too often individualized play was on full display Friday night.
The Friars poor play found themselves in a 45-28 hole at halftime. PC did make a run cutting it to as low as 7 points, but as soon as they did the Wildcats exposed the Friars for all the issues they have and pushed it back to 18 points rather quickly.
We’ve reached the point of the season where we are just hoping to see the Friars show signs of life for a potential Big East Tournament run. Instead, PC gave us plenty of reasons to believe that the 2025-2026 season is a lost cause.
OK BOC I gave you your skeleton, and I’ll leave it to you to discuss the reasons the Friars had an uninspiring effort against Villanova.
Alright, Crier. I’ll take it from here. Enjoy your weekend of debauchery and tomfoolery in the mountains while I change diapers for the next 48 hours. Remember to not eat the yellow snow…
Continue reading “The Bottom Has Fallen Out: A Connected Villanova Wildcats Best Friars 87-73”After blowing a 21-point second half home lead to Georgetown, it would be expected that the Friars would get blasted in a trip to Storrs, CT to take on the #2 UConn Huskies. We at The Providence Crier didn’t think the team would be able to pick themselves off the mat and both of us predicted a loss that flirted with the 15.5 point spread. Instead the Friars came out, competed, and made UConn earn a 6-point victory for their 16th consecutive win.
Providence was led by strong games from Oswin Erhunmwunse, Jamier Jones and Jaylin Sellers but down the stretch PC turned it over and couldn’t get key stops or rebounds for what might’ve been the most shocking upset of the college basketball season.
When it happened no one actually had a clue how it would work out.
On March 20th, 2023 it was announced that Ed Cooley would leave Providence College after 12 seasons to coach at Georgetown University. It was the first and only time in the history of the Big East a coach left one Big East program for another. At the time the college basketball national media pundits would tell you that Georgetown, with their tradition and history, was a better job than Providence. Providence fans would chirp back whether or not that was actually the case given the Hoyas epic fall from college basketball glory, while the support and fan base of Providence had never been stronger.
Georgetown fans, for the most part, agreed with the national media and felt with Georgetown’s “war chest” of resources and Cooley’s coaching acumen the Hoyas would be back to national prominence in no time.
So, 2.5 years later, is that the case?
Continue reading “This Is Year 3: Looking Back at Cooley’s Decision”Milwaukee has always been a difficult place for the Friars to play. Entering Martin Luther King Day’s early evening tip against Marquette, the Friars posted a 3-15 record for road games against the Golden Eagles and hadn’t won since 2020. With 37 seconds remaining in regulation and PC up 4, it seemed like PC would snap its 5-game losing streak at Marquette and perhaps Friar fans would make the comparison to the 2020 team who was struggling going into the Marquette game only to complete a big turnaround by season’s end. Instead PC made crucial error after crucial error late in regulation and in overtime and fell to a struggling Golden Eagles club.
With the loss PC fell to 9-10 (2-6) on the season in which it’s getting harder and harder to glean any positives. PC once again got great contributions from their freshmen duo of Stefan Vaaks (26 points) and Jamier Jones (17 points), but they both made key errors in crunch time. Senior captain Corey Floyd Jr had the ball for what seemingly should’ve been the last shot of overtime in a game tied at 104, but he turned it over and fouled allowing Marquette to hit a free throw to secure the win. Providence is now 0-4 on the season in overtime games and 1-6 in games decided by 6 points or less.
The Friars were looking to bounce back after a lackluster performance in Cincinnati over the weekend when they hosted the Villanova Wildcats Tuesday night at the AMP. However, that same lackluster effort spilled over into the first half where the Friars committed countless turnovers, let Villanova stroke it from deep, and found themselves in 12-point hole at the break.
PC put forth a much better effort in the second half cutting the deficit to 5 points on a few occasions, but couldn’t make enough plays or get enough defensive rebounds to complete the comeback. The Friars have now lost three straight games after knocking off St. Johns in Madison Square Garden 10 days ago. With the loss PC is now 8-9 on the season, 1-5 in league play and are 0-3 in league games at Amica Mutual Pavillion. Clearly it appears we are in for another long winter in Friartown.
