The Friars look to have finally cracked after their loss to Marquette
Even the most hopeful of Friar fans would have been hard-pressed to find many reasons for hope entering Tuesday night’s game against Marquette. The Golden Eagles drilled Providence, 78-50, on New Year’s Eve and entered this one in desperate need of a victory following a loss to Villanova that dropped them to 2-4 in their last six games.
In even the best of years, Providence has struggled in Milwaukee. PC was 3-15 at Marquette entering this one, and the current edition of the Friars was 2-11 away from the AMP before last night’s 82-52 drubbing by Marquette.
This was a season that never got off the ground, but up until the past week or so the Friars deserved some level of credit for continuing to play hard while shorthanded.
That was the case up until the past week, at least.
Providence came out surprisingly lifeless against Ed Cooley and Georgetown a week ago and fell, 93-72, to the Hoyas. Georgetown spent much of the second half preening with little done to deter them from doing so.
Tuesday night against Marquette was more of the same. Shaka Smart’s crew suffocated Providence defensively (the Friars shot 6-26 from deep, 1-14 in the second half) and got whatever shot they wanted on the other end. Marquette’s 17 made threes were one shy of a program record, and it seemed as though whenever they missed they grabbed an offensive rebound and scored again.
The Friars have gone with 12 different starting lineups this year. The starting group they rolled out last night fell to 0-4 on the season.
There’s no need to delve too deep into the numbers from this one. The final score says it all. What’s jarring is seeing a lack of a response from this program after such an embarrassing loss at Georgetown.
It was a group that certainly had its shortcomings once the injuries piled up, but the effort was consistently there.
That effort hasn’t been close the past two games.
Maybe this is just life in the NIL and portal era — where mercenaries have little reason to invest once the season has gone sideways and those with eligibility remaining start to wonder (or hear) what’s out there for them in free agency.
Providence hasn’t fallen victim to the portal in the two springs since Kim English was hired, and the team had stayed engaged up until the past two games. But, minus a few exceptions, the Friars watched Marquette laugh and smile its way through running them off the court — just as Georgetown had done a week prior.
In both losses to Marquette this season, the Friars trailed by over 30 points.
Their most notable response on Tuesday came from an assistant coach with under a minute remaining in the game.
With three games left in the regular season (and two coming at home), it’s possible that Providence shows some fight down the stretch, but the past two games looked like a team that had finally cracked after after an incredibly challenging season.
This one was what it was. I think most teams ultimately have breaking points.
The Georgetown game bothered me, for a team that has fought all year to just fold against that flawed and undermanned team…it hurt.
The Marquette game represented what was an extreme but not completely illogical outcome of what very likely should have been most games this year..that they avoided it for the most part is a credit to the staff and players.
Almost everything went wrong this year for a team with a young coach. But compare that to a Nova team with a young coach, with significantly more resources and 2 recent national championships. They’ve been mostly healthy, with lottery picks and the nation’s leading scorer…and they aren’t much better. Perspective.
Like players, Coaches improve and develop as well. This team has a lot of high end talent - most of it as complimentary around a star that never played. Whenever they adjusted and began to play well, another would get hurt and shuffle it all.
I’ve been hard on Pierre…but that’s because he’s Junior PG who’s played a lot of minutes…I don’t need the points I need the composure and good decisions. That’s been by frustration. But he’s in a position that’s asking too much of him…they’ve needed him to be all conference and a top 1-2 player on the team. I don’t think he’s that…but that doesn’t mean he isn’t worth keeping or pushed out.
I want to see a season where Kim and his staff have most of “their” guys (not 4-5 mercenaries)…and while injuries happen, I’d like to have one where there isn’t a catastrophic change to the planned team. If things remain consistent, then sure…but not yet. Stay supportive…PC may not have the NIL/donor mega base of other programs, what we do have is a community that so many others don’t. Let’s not lose that…coaches, players, recruits…they see it they value it. Stay critical…but not negative and always supportive. It’s why I love reading Kevin’s content…
Kevin, I think you have captured the mood perfectly. I did think I was watching an episode of Last Chance U against Marquette where it was everyman for himself; a very "mercenary" vibe as you well described it.
Something definitely cracked or went "pop" Tuesday night. But I still don't know what I am looking at and what I heard. Did I watch what I think I watched - Shaka Smart completely exploiting a team with A10 level talent? Was something more than just the tail end of an injury plagued, snakebit season exposed here? Up until now I thought it was just a bad season with some unlucky injuries and unlucky portal bets that we could throw away, learn from, move on from.
But after watching Marquette shoot 10-3 pointers in a row to start the game, take 26 3s in the first half and shoot 67% of their shots in the game from behind the arc....now I am scratching my chin a bit. Marquette had one other game this year where they took 65% of their shots from three-land, and that was early in the season against Central Michigan. They had a couple of other games in the 55% range, and on the season are at 46%. This game was an outlier, and by design. Shaka Smart saw something structurally exploitable in the Friars defense--akin to what he saw with mid-major Central Michigan (!!) and the Friars couldn't adjust and stop it at all. Is that bad coaching by the Friars? If coaching means "roster construction" then yes. But was it bad X's and O's in game where we were so clearly outmatched? I don't know.
And when it was clear that Joseph--our one semi-consistently shining star this year--getting benched for play that was so bad that only the really trained eye could apparently notice (cause I certainly didn't), then Bonke is on the court--apparently no longer dead to him, but Christ again dead to him...one had to wonder--is a clear pattern beginning to reveal itself with Coach English? Are all the refs and all the players working against him...or is he working against himself by flailing around, blameshifting, missing (or not accepting) root causes?
Then we have fans wanting Pierre's head...after he gets 13 points on 11 shots and double digits in 9 straight games...but somehow he's the real problem(??). But when Floyd lays an egg not a peep except for a few twitter calls that he will make All BE next year. Same for Mela. He can't shoot, averages 1.8 assists per game and 4.1 per 40 minutes, and fans see him somehow as Walt Williams. Now we all miss Jabri and realize now that he might have been a big part of the answer if he had been given a little more leash early on...but first half of the season he was drawing the ire that Pierre now draws. Fans are all over the place. Understandable because that's what loosing does to you. But very few seem to know where exactly we are in the forest and which direction to start walking to get out of it.
If I take a step back and look at the forest, not the trees, here's what I am wondering: Are we watching Providence have a tough time this season with a second year head coach? Run of the mill type stuff and we will get 'em next year? Or are we watching a mid-tier Big East team in the midst of a roster construction struggle that has the larger dynamics structurally leaning against us...does the Portal/NIL era now require more cash than a smallish school without football can come up with?
These are all questions, not conclusions masquerading as questions. I honestly don't know what I am watching right now. Curious to see where it all goes.
Two recommendations though: (1) fans should stop talking about needing to move on from Pierre, Fernandez, or whomever the scapegoat of the moment is. Providence doesn't have the NIL resources to get into the perpetual portal game, and we are going to need to develop players, even if their ceiling is to be good, but perhaps not great, as upperclassman. To be "average" is not the same thing as being "replacement level", to borrow a baseball truism. (2) More objective analysis served up like this from folks like you, the Ultimate Cranston guy, and a couple of others. There's a lot going on here right now, some of it micro, some of it macro, forces. The "let's kill Pierre" crowd doesn't help much. Thinking things through actually does.