Providence basketball's new coach knows he has to prove himself as the new guy in town

Thinking out loud … while wondering if smoking can kill you, and eating bacon isn’t good for you, why is smoking bacon the cure for everything?

◘Disrespect to Providence? It was more like kneeling at the altar of guys like Rick Pitino and Sean Miller this week at Big East Media Day. The Friars were picked seventh in the preseason coaches' poll, behind both Pitino’s St. John’s team and Miller’s Xavier squad.

And as my buddy Kevin McNamara pointed out last week: Since the realignment of the Big East in 2013, Providence has been picked this low in only two other seasons — 2017 (ninth) and 2021 (seventh). The Friars finished third in 2017-18 and first in 2021-22.

It’s a coaching thing. The new guy, Kim English, needs to show what he and his team can do, and he knows that. But his confidence level should be high for a finish above what his fellow coaches believe, behind the Bryce Hopkins (preseason first team) and Devin Carter (preseason honorable mention, second team last year) combo.

◘Not one but two ex-Providence coaches (Pitino at St. John's, Ed Cooley at Georgetown) are now coaching other programs in the Big East. Need to revive your moribund program? Hire a Friar.

◘Here’s how I see it this season: 1, Marquette; 2, Creighton; 3, UConn; 4, Villanova; 5, St. John’s; 6, Providence; 7, Xavier; 8, Seton Hall; 9, Georgetown; 10, Butler; 11, DePaul. The coaches’ picks are notoriously off-kilter.

◘PC has questions to answer in the post, especially with Josh Oduro’s ankle injury that has had him sit out through the Mal Brown and St. Joseph’s scrimmages. If healthy, the Friars should compete for a top-four finish.

◘Cumberland native and Marquette guard Tyler Kolek was named the Big East preseason Player of the Year, which is not a surprise since he won the season honor a year ago. English played him one-on-one, too, to try to keep him at George Mason. Beat him, too, but Kolek still took off for Marquette.

Hey coach, do you have any eligibility left?

◘What kind of a league will the Big East really be this season? Take note: Three Bob Cousy Award candidates (Best Point Guard, including Kolek), five Jerry West’s (Best Shooting Guard), four Julius Erving’s (Best Small Forward), three Karl Malone’s (Best Power Forward, including PC’s Hopkins) play on Big East teams. Getcha’ popcorn ready.

◘You can blame conference realignment on the apparent demise of the Gavitt Games between the Big East and Big Ten after this season. Big East commish Val Ackerman said as much last week. Couldn’t someone find a way to play at, I don’t know, a neutral site over a two-or-three-day stretch?

◘Something tells me Dave Gavitt would have found a way to play.

◘Poaching doesn’t just happen in the Big Ten or Big 12, ya’ know. The Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference will add Sacred Heart and Merrimack from the Northeast Conference (Bryant’s former home) beginning in 2024-25.

• And Army will join the American Athletic Conference for football only, essentially replacing SMU, which is headed to the ACC. Army’s other sports will stay in the Patriot League. The Army-Navy game, which this year is in Foxboro for the first time, will remain a nonleague contest between the academies even though both will be football members of the AAC. Got all that?

◘Next year, UConn, UMass and Notre Dame will be the only remaining independents in the Football Bowl Sub-division. Which of these schools is not like the others?

◘The Friar ladies were slotted for ninth out of 11 Big East teams, with UConn picked overwhelmingly at the top. The challenge is an obvious one for new head coach Erin Batth in her first head coaching job — return PC to respectability in a league it dominated (like UConn now does) 30 years ago.

◘The Bryant men, coaching uncertainty and all, were selected third in America East’s preseason poll behind Vermont and UMass Lowell. Sherif Gross-Bullock and Earl Timberlake were both named to the preseason all-conference team.

◘Former Friar Kris Dunn’s contract has been guaranteed for the entire season by the Utah Jazz, completing a comeback to full-time NBA status for the former first-round draft pick. And ex-Friar David Duke, after being cut by Philadelphia, is expected to suit up for the G League Delaware Blue Coats.

◘One more: Former Friar Justin Minaya has signed a two-way deal with the Portland Trail Blazers.

◘Rhody secret-scrimmaged Harvard and will play an exhibition against Assumption on Wednesday. Is it just me, or are more of these “secret” things actually being kept a secret this year?

◘The best news from Rhody, however, came with the pronouncement of $82.3 million in improvements to the athletic facilities, including Meade Stadium. A new-look Meade could be ready by 2026.

◘Don’t look now, but Nate Leaman has PC men’s hockey ranked seventh in the national polls this week, after wins at Schneider Arena over No. 2 Denver and RPI last week.

◘X post of the week I, from @MarkDivver: “Best atmosphere at a game at PC in years last night. Place was packed, students were loud and stayed until the end to see the Friars beat No. 2 Denver. Great show.”

◘My buddy “Big E” sez he’s discovered that being an adult is just walking around wondering what you’re forgetting.

◘X post of the Week II, from @BostonSportsInf last Sunday: “Patriots have a lead at home for the first time all season. It took 184:58 minutes of game time. Ugh.”

◘As fun as that finish was in Foxboro, the Patriots still almost blew it. Only this time, the Bills’ self-inflicted wounds were a bit more serious.

◘Wait, why so much celebration over beating Buffalo? TB12 was 33-3 against those guys, which shows you just how remarkable his play, and that streak, both were.

◘Not for nuthin’, but methinks the Bills’ WOO (Window of Opportunity) to finally win a Big One has passed them by.

◘Did you like how the news of Bill Belichick's “lucrative” contract extension leaked into the hands of the media just as it appeared the proverbial hammer was about to fall? Get a grip. The man has forgotten more football than you or I will ever know.

◘I thought the Bruins weren’t expected to be any good this season. Their best start in 86 years? Ridiculous. If they can get out of the first round of the Stanley Cup playoffs, it might mean something. Just sayin’.

◘Be careful with the hype about the Celtics. Expectations have a way of coming back to bite — see Patriots, New England, for confirmation on that one.

◘Healthy = Happy. Injuries = Uncertainty. That’s the Celtics' season in a nutshell. And Jayson needs to keep his <3 for Jaylen. I should charge the Two Jays a consulting fee.

◘So the Red Sox Chief Baseball Officer job couldn’t draw flies for weeks, until a former pitcher who helped the team win a World Series stepped in to take the ball. Except that he’s never run his own team before.

Hope Craig Breslow knows what he’s getting into. But someone who isn’t all nerd (a Yale grad with a degree in molecular biophysics) does have some intrigue here. I mean, the guy played.

◘An ESPN nugget: The last time both World Series teams were at 50-1 odds to win it all going into a season (Texas was 50-1, Arizona 125-1) was in 1991. Back then, the 80-1 Twins beat the 200-1 Braves.

◘Congrats to the Rangers on reaching the Series. They were my team as a teen. The Rangers had just moved to Arlington, Texas, from Washington, D.C. (they were the Senators) and the one-and-only Ted Williams was their manager.

My mom, at the time, was a bigwig with the Fort Worth Junior Women’s Club and decided she needed someone from the Rangers to speak to her organization since they were new in town. She marched right into Arlington Stadium (an overgrown Double-A park put on steroids) to meet Teddy Ballgame.

Walked right into the team locker room, she did. Sent the entire team scurrying for cover since they had just come off the field and were showering. Mom, apparently, was oblivious to the nakedness that surrounded her. She had me and my brother and father, so nothing fazed her.

Once she was ushered into Ted’s office, the Rangers’ manager and Hall of Famer took an immediate liking to my mom, especially for her "chutzpah" in entering the unprepared locker room unannounced. Told her he was a little busy preparing for the upcoming season, but he’d find someone who could speak to her group.

Williams also signed three baseballs — for me, my brother and sister — and gave them to my mom. Loved the Rangers ever since. Loved my mom even more.

◘Steve emailed me this week on the new Olympic sports: “You failed to mention squash making the 2028 Olympics. This is probably the most abused sport to not get in yet. The one negative: it doesn't televise well, being on a small court and has limited appeal to revenue producing TV.”

Steve: I think you hit the nail on the head with the TV part. Olympic success comes from television and the ensuing revenue. If you can’t translate the sport to TV, it can’t make $$$. Or at least, not as much. And the perception of being an "elitist" sport likely doesn’t play well in some parts of Planet Earff. But I love squash, especially on the grill brushed with a little olive oil and lemon pepper.

Interested in having your questions on Rhode Island sports (and yes, that includes the Patriots, Red Sox, Bruins, and Celtics) answered in a somewhat timely fashion? Think out loud and send your questions, comments, and local stories to jrbroadcaster@gmail.com. We’ll share mailbag comments/Facebook posts/threads right here! Join me on Twitter/X, @JRbroadcaster…on Facebook, www.facebook.com/john.rooke, and on Instagram and Threads @JRbroadcaster.

This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: Providence basketball coach Kim English knows he has to prove himself