Friar Basketball Newsletter: Kicking the Season Off with Late Night Madness, A Pleasant Early Surprise, New Offers, Previewing Marquette, and more
Providence hosted its annual Late Night Madness event at the Amica Mutual Pavilion on Saturday, and by all reports the night was a success. Notably, three New England recruits who visited for the event walked away with scholarship offers from the Friars. Read more about all three of these prospects here. You can also see the sights and sounds from Madness in this article.
Last week also brought the return of the Ed Cooley Radio Show with host John Rooke. The season debut included Cooley sharing early impressions of his team, an interview with Louisville transfer Noah Locke, and insight from Kevin McNamara. Perhaps the most interesting quote from the show came after Rooke asked Locke who had surprised him most through offseason workouts and early practices. Locke shared that he has been most impressed by the athleticism of UConn transfer Corey Floyd Jr.
You can read Locke’s thoughts on Floyd in our News and Notes column from this week. The article also includes quotes from Cooley’s appearance Thursday night, Locke detailing his relationship with and recruitment by Cooley, notes on a pair of recruits that Providence is turning up the heat on, and more.
Our latest preview of a Big East program examines how Shaka Smart will look to build off of an NCAA Tournament appearance in his first year at Marquette with a relatively inexperienced group.
This week’s newsletter also includes the latest edition of our “Season in Review” series, with a look back at the Friars’ overtime win against DePaul and an epic night against Villanova at home.
Over the weekend, the Pawtucket Times/Woonsocket Call’s Brendan McGair broke the news that PC assistant Bob Walsh was leaving the staff for another opportunity. McNamara followed up that report by noting that Walsh was headed to Iona to join Rick Pitino’s staff. Walsh re-joined the Friar staff in 2019, and has always been very open about his love for Providence College as an institution and the opportunity to coach at such a unique school. He will be very much missed.
We are less than two weeks away from seeing this team take to the floor together at the Mal Brown scrimmage. Anticipation will be high with so many talented new players and the success of last season. We can’t wait to cover it all.
Thanks for reading Friar Basketball!