Even if it was inevitable, the Ed Cooley Story in Providence should have ended differently than this

Just about a year ago, I found myself roaming an empty hallway at the United Center in Chicago. Providence’s season, one of the best in program history, had just ended about 45 minutes prior in a Sweet 16 battle with Kansas.

It was the end of a magical run and a devastating loss for a Friar team that had taken the lead late, but just didn’t have enough to overcome the eventual national champions.

As I circled the arena trying to think of how I could possibly capture what it was like to be in that building, and what it felt like to see such an amazingly enjoyable group of Friars have their hearts broken, I saw Ed Cooley in the distance walking toward me with one of his assistants.

They were on their way to the team bus, and Cooley had just given a gut-wrenchingly passionate speech to his team in the locker room — a speech that CBS Sports captured for the world to see.

I could only imagine what Cooley was going through and had no intention of stopping or saying anything beyond “Great season, Ed.”

As I prepared to give him a quick handshake and be on my way, Cooley stopped to talk. “I can’t tell you how much I appreciated the coverage this year,” he said. I thanked him, asked an ill-timed question about the game that he wasn’t in a place to answer, and soon enough we were on our separate ways. He got on the team bus, and I was off to write.

His heart was broken and he was thanking me, an independent writer?

In all honesty, my relationship with Cooley hadn’t gone beyond anything other than Friar-related content. He really did us a favor in the early days of the site by doing 1-1 interviews after most games, he hopped on our podcast last summer, and I’d see him out at prep games at times. We weren’t exactly texting buddies, however.

But conversations like the one in the hallway were the types of things I saw Cooley do consistently over the past 12 years. Most times he did them when no one was looking.

Sure, I would have loved to have had more access, but it was a worthwhile tradeoff: a coach who represented my alma mater so well, who reached seven NCAA Tournaments (he’d be quick to say eight with the Covid-shortened season of 2020) and who played such a crucial role in revitalizing a dormant program.

At times, I wondered if we asked too much of him, or if he took too much on. Ed Cooley was so much more than a basketball coach at Providence, and that’s why this stings so much. Maybe he meant more to Providence College than Providence College meant to him.

As much as I appreciated all that made Cooley special, there were glimpses of cracks in the narrative about Cooley being a lifer here, if you looked closely enough.

A year before taking the Providence job in 2011, Cooley interviewed for the head coaching spot at Boston College — a school that had fired his mentor Al Skinner weeks prior. Cooley had turned down an opportunity to interview with Seton Hall that spring, but told the Connecticut Post that he considered the BC gig “my dream job.” When asked about Skinner’s firing he said, “It caught me by surprise, but at the end of the day, it's a business.”

It’s a business that Cooley is exceptional at in more ways than one.

Critics will point to his 3-7 record in the NCAA Tournament as his biggest blemish, but there is no denying the job the Providence native did in his hometown. Since the inception of the Big East in 1979, the Friars went to the NCAA Tournament seven times from the berth of the league prior to Cooley’s arrival — a span of 32 years. They would have gone in eight of ten years if the 2020 postseason had been played.

He was the perfect coach at the time of his hiring, and appeared to have Providence peaking over the past two years — both on the floor and in terms of acquiring talent.

Cooley took care of business away from the floor as well. When his contract was extended after last season, it marked the third time in six years that he received a contract extension.

Without Cooley, Providence probably doesn’t build a $30 million dollar practice facility in September 2018. At the dedication of the building Cooley told the crowd, “I’m living a dream every day, and I don’t want anybody to wake me the hell up. Ever!”

Eight months later he was being courted by Michigan to take over their program, before deciding to stay at PC with a contract extension in hand. “While it's very flattering to be considered for other head coaching jobs, after talking with my family I have decided to remain in my hometown of Providence,” Cooley said at the time. “The Friars are my family. Most importantly, my commitment is to my players and my team at Providence.”

Providence truly may have been Ed Cooley’s ultimate dream job, but if you were paying close enough attention there were signs that it might not be his forever job.

Yet, how this situation deteriorated this February and March blindsided everyone.

I always thought there was a strong possibility Cooley could one day leave. Those fears lessened over the past two years when PC was seemingly building something truly special under him. Cooley just needed one true breakout year to take this program to the next level, and after 12 years it looked as though Providence had finally gotten there under him.

When reporters started linking his name to the Georgetown opening in January, it seemed unfathomable. Ed Cooley was not coming back to Providence leading another Big East program. No shot in hell. Plus, the Friars had it rolling at the time.

A two-game home stand in February (that included wins over Creighton and Villanova) brought Providence’s record this year to 20-7 overall. They were 15-4 from the beginning of December until mid-February.

Then the bottom fell out — and it did so out of nowhere.

The Friars got demolished at Connecticut, with Cooley vowing things would be different if the Huskies and Friars met again in MSG.

His final victory came, ironically, at lowly Georgetown on Feb. 26. PC closed by losing their first two home games of the season in March, including a blowout loss against a very average Seton Hall team. They trailed by 26 to UConn in the Big East Tournament, before making a push and falling late. By this point, the Cooley-to-Georgetown rumors were spreading all over NYC and beyond. In his postgame press conference after the UConn loss in the Garden, Cooley said that no one should be surprised to see his team playing in the Final Four in a few weeks.

Eight days later, Providence saw their offense go lifeless against a beatable Kentucky team in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, but the game had essentially become an afterthought. Cooley’s potential departure was all of the focus.

Three days later, he was gone.

Essentially anything that could have been handled poorly from a PR perspective was over the final weeks of Cooley’s tenure. Typically charming and gregarious, he was uncharacteristically evasive at times. He denied knowing that the Georgetown rumors were even out there on Selection Sunday, wouldn’t answer much before and after the Kentucky loss on Friday, and spoke in circles with WPRI’s Morey Hershgordon on his coach’s show on Sunday. At one point he told Hershgordon he was “very excited about our group”, but he also mentioned the need to have “open and honest” conversations about his future on three occasions, and talked about the need to consider emotional well-being when looking at what was next for him. Cooley told Hershgordon that Providence continued to be his dream job.

He said he hadn’t been offered anything by Georgetown on his coach’s show on Sunday afternoon. By Monday morning, news broke that his house was on the market. Hours later, Ed Cooley was the new head coach at Georgetown. The deal is for a reported $6 million a year, according to John Fanta of Fox Sports.

No one actually believes there was no contact prior to this weekend, or that an offer wasn’t on the table well before Sunday night. And if you’re surprised by the actions of Georgetown’s administration, you haven’t been paying attention to virtually anything that has taken place in college athletics over the past 20 years.

The “like-minded” schools of the Big East conference? The reality of a coach for life? Both went out the window on Monday.

It cuts both ways, of course. When an unproductive player transfers and a team “frees up a scholarship” or when a coach is fired after a couple of down seasons, fans are quick to move onto what’s next. We certainly saw that when Georgetown let go of John Thompson III after he reached 8 NCAA Tournaments and a Final Four in 13 years there.

The difference is fans aren’t disingenuous about it.

We get it, Georgetown is a bigger brand that has greater tradition, deeper pockets, and more local talent. Six million dollars and a lot more privacy, with a program that most see as having a higher ceiling is obviously appealing.

I wasn’t quite old enough to remember when Rick Pitino left Providence for the Knicks, but certainly heard enough from Friar fans who never forgot. This will take a long time for Cooley to recover from in the eyes of PC supporters. He never will to many. Not when the season fell apart, coincidentally or not, so dramatically late in the year. Not when he is competing directly with the program he called family for so long.

And that’s the shame in this. Cooley always seemed different, seemed so much more genuine — and his 12 years here seemed to unravel so quickly. Breakups are rarely pretty, but this one should have ended so much differently.