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Retention Attention: Who’s In? Who’s Out in Providence?

With the transfer portal and NIL age of college basketball, you have to essentially recruit every player on your roster every offseason. Kim English has done a fantastic job at player retention so far in his first two years at Providence, with Bryce Hopkins this year being the sole outlier. He had Devin Carter and Bryce Hopkins stay in Friartown when he first took the job post Ed Cooley. He retained Garwey Dual who was a prized high school recruit at the time. This past offseason he kept Bryce Hopkins in black and white coming off the ACL injury despite a last minute courtship by a fellow Big East program. Almost every time English wants to retain a player, he does. It’s a quality trait.

Going into this offseason and the Friars coming off a 20 loss season, it was going to be interesting to see who would be staying in Providence and who could possibly seek greener pastures elsewhere. Boy has this roster turned over.

We take a look at who is remaining in Providence to date and who will decide to move on. Lastly, we’ll wrap with what it means for the 2025-2026 roster.

Big East Tournament Opener: Providence Squares Up with Butler in Rubber Match

The Providence Friars are probably embracing the fact that it is a new season, and everyone’s record is 0-0. PC enters NYC losing 9 of their last 10 games and all but can guarantee they have their first 20 loss season since 1985 and only second in program history. However, none of that matters. The Friars get one more opportunity, one more chance to change the perception of what their season is. They need to take it one game at a time and that starts on Wednesday at 4pm when the Friars play the Butler Bulldogs at Madison Square Garden. The two schools split their season series with the Friars taking the home game back in January by 19 but fell at Hinkle Fieldhouse by a point back in February. What is it going to take for the Friars to survive and advance to extend their season one more game?

Thankfully, The Friars Wrap Up The Regular Season at Xavier

It was suggested that BOC and I take the rest of the season off to gear up for next season given the place the 2024-2025 Friars are in. However, that’s not how we roll. To quote Jordan Belfort, “the show goes on!”.

And if you’re asking yourself well why wasn’t there a preview and recap article to the DePaul game my response is I have no clue what you are talking about. If the Friars did play DePaul and blew a 16 point lead losing their final game at home I think we would’ve wrote about it.

https://twitter.com/jeffbausch18/status/1894562350264377727?s=46

Anyways, the Friars will wrap up their regular season Saturday in Cincy as they take on Xavier at 4pm (FS1). For the Friars it’s about trying to find something, anything, to build upon prior to the Big East Tournament on Wednesday. For Xavier they’re trying to continue their strong close to the season. The Musketeers are still on the bubble, but they are doing their best effort to be on the right side of the bubble, currently riding a 6-game win streak which started at Providence. Unfortunately for the Musketeers, none of those games were a resume win that can have them feeling good going into Selection Sunday. In fact they really need to avoid dropping this one to the Friars if they want to make the Big Dance. A loss here would be a resume killer.

Barrage of 3s and Suffocating Defense: Marquette Routs Friars Again

Given the way the first game went against Marquette, how the season has transpired since, and the fact the Friars have been historically bad in Milwaukee, expecting a win Tuesday night from PC was a fool’s errand. On the flip side, given the way the Friars have been able to compete most nights despite all the injuries, the fact that Marquette was scuffling of late (5-5 last 10, 2-4 last 6), and that it was the Friars’ second crack at the Golden Eagles, the expectation would’ve been the Friars would play much better than their 28-point home loss on New Years’ Eve. However, that would not be the case as the Marquette Golden Eagles once again steamrolled the Friars this time to the tune of 82-52.

Marquette was in need of a bounce back performance after the 81-66 loss at Villanova over the weekend. They got that and then some. Marquette hit 17 three pointers, and their suffocating defense gave the Friars fits all night but especially in the second half where the rout was on.

The bottom has fallen out for the Friars on this season. The second half was a half of jubilation for the Golden Eagles, with them celebrating made buckets with joy and without any resistance from the Friars. The Golden Eagles were hootin and hollerin (pardon the pun) the entire second half, and Providence willingly accepted their fate without any resistance.

That was the most depressing aspect of this game, and you walk away from the game somewhat embarrassed for the program and players. Providence didn’t belong on the same court as Marquette, and that has nothing to do with injuries. The effort and desire weren’t there, and THAT is the biggest issue.

Cooley Attains First Win Against Providence College, as Hoyas Blow Out the Friars

In a year full of injuries and inconsistencies from these Friars, Wednesday’s game against the Georgetown Hoyas summed up PC’s season pretty fittingly. On Saturday the Friars held probably the conference’s best half-court offense to under 50 points with under 5 minutes left in the game. On Wednesday, the Friars gave up their most points all season in a 93-72 defeat against a pretty pedestrian offensive outfit in Georgetown.

In regard to injuries, the Friars have been dealt bad hand after bad hand when it came to player’s health, but going into this game things seemed to be trending in their favor. Wesley Cardet would return to the Friar lineup after an 18-day absence. While Corey Floyd Jr remained out with a concussion, their opponent was dealing with a pretty big absence of their own. Soon to be Big East Freshman of the year Thomas Sorber was held out of this one with turf toe. Yet none of those things seemed to matter as Georgetown would land a knockout blow late in the first half once Oswin exited the game with foul trouble, and the Friars could never quite get themselves off the canvas.

Depleted Friars Fall to Xavier 91-82

The Dunk, now Amica Mutual Pavilion, has seen some weird things go down. Between a player’s brother accosting a referee mid game to dispute a foul or games against Xavier and Seton Hall that saw delays due to condensation on the court, the Dunk has played host to some strange games. Well, categorize Wednesday’s night’s contest against Xavier into the weird category. The Friars would start off this game clicking on all cylinders building a 16-5 lead early. Kim English would then receive his first technical of the season. Xavier would proceed to go on a massive run, Kim would get his second technical and ejection in the second half, and the Friars would cut a 26-point deficit into a 9-point game until the Musketeers would leave with a 91-82 victory over PC.

For Xavier it was a game they couldn’t afford to lose for their at large aspirations and for most of the game they played like it. As for the Friars the loss is their 4th in a row putting them at 11-14 on the year in what has been a trying season for the group.

Creighton Comes Into the AMP and Sweeps Providence

The Friars returned to the Amica Mutual Pavilion on Wednesday night hoping to gain a victory over Creighton after a heartbreaking loss for the second time this season by St. Johns. The Friars went to Creighton a few weeks ago and found themselves a loser by 20 points. They were hoping for a different result this time around.

In the first game against the Jays,the Friars lost by 20 but the Crier truly felt they could win the re-match in Providence. However, Ryan Kalkbrenner and Steven Ashworth had other ideas as the Jays were able to secure the 80-69 victory.

Jersey Boys: NJ Natives of Providence Have Big Homecoming as Friars Escape Newark with a Win

It wasn’t always pretty, but the Friars walked into the Prudential Center last night and left with a 69-67 victory and a season sweep of the Seton Hall Pirates. With the win the Friars are now back over .500 on the season at 11-10 and are an even 5-5 in Big East play. Jayden Pierre, originally from Elizabeth, NJ, led the Friars in scoring with 16 points but this was another one of those team efforts with 5 players scoring in double figures and 8 guys registering at least a point. The Friars held a 15-point second half lead in this one until the Pirates had a furious comeback which would see them take a lead. To the Friars credit, they weathered that storm and then managed to make just enough free throws and inbound passes down the stretch to get a win.

Friars Seek First Q1 Win on Road Against Villanova

Marquette, Creighton, UConn, and Villanova. Those are the four programs that Kim English views as first tier this season in the Big East. The Friars have faced three of those teams thus far and are 0-3. Add the home loss to St. Johns and that puts the Friars record in Quad 1 games at 0-4 on the season. Now the Friars turn their sights to Philly with a Friday night matchup against the Villanova Wildcats.

Make or Miss League: Jays Get Hot, Friars Go Cold in 20 Point Defeat

The Friars offense was hot heading into Omaha with a road tilt against the Creighton Blue Jays. In their last three games the Friars averaged over 86 points and shot 42% from three that stretch. In this game, the Friars went cold, and the Jays rained threes all night en route to a 84-64 defeat for PC. Friars are now back to .500 at 9-9 on the year and dropped to 3-4 in Big East play.

Friars Defeat Seton Hall Behind Bensley Joseph’s 7 Threes

On a snow day at the Amica Mutual Pavilion, the Providence Friars were able to secure a 91-85 over the Seton Hall Pirates. The Friars were led in scoring by Bensley Joseph, who came off the bench to score 28 points, a career high, and made seven three pointers. With the victory, PC is now back over .500 at 9-8 and won back-to-back games for the first time since November 19th.

We break down how the Friars secured the victory.

Winning Streak? Seton Hall Preview

Friars Host Butler in a Game Where Something Has Got to Give

The Friars and Bulldogs have been struggling of late. Providence enters Wednesday night’s game against Butler at the AMP on a 4-game losing streak and losers of eight of their last ten. Butler, on the other hand, is riding a 7-game losing streak and are already 0-4 in conference play. Something has got to give at 8:30pm at the AMP.

Will the Friars end their 4-game losing streak and work their way back to .500 in the Big East or will the Bulldogs get on the board in the league? Let’s take a deeper dive into tonight’s tilt.