By Lew Gould
ESPN is reporting that Providence coach Ed Cooley has accepted Georgetown’s offer to be head coach.
The Cooley hire marks a significant upgrade from the doldrums Georgetown’s program endured under Patrick Ewing, which included a 29-game conference losing streak and 13-50 record the past two seasons.
Cooley has consistently overachieved at Providence, reaching the NCAA tournament in seven of the past nine years it has been held, and that run includes a Big East regular-season championship in 2021-22.
Georgetown has reached the NCAA tournament in just one of the past seven years that it has been held, and the school extended Ewing after he clinched his lone NCAA bid by winning the Big East tournament in a year that it finished 13-13. Georgetown hasn’t finished with a winning record in the Big East since 2014-15.
Cooley went 242-153 over 12 seasons at Providence, and he has turned down prestigious jobs like Michigan in 2019 when the Wolverines ultimately hired Juwan Howard. He withdrew from the job after conversations with Michigan athletic director Warde Manuel, returning to a multiyear contract extension with Providence.
Cooley, a Providence native, has spent his entire coaching career in New England. He started as an assistant coach at UMass Dartmouth and Stonehill College, his alma mater. He then spent a year as an assistant coach at Rhode Island before following Al Skinner to Boston College for a decade as his assistant.
Cooley’s first head-coaching job came at Fairfield, where he led the Stags to a MAAC regular-season title in 2011 before being hired at his hometown school to replace Keno Davis.
In 12 seasons with the Friars, Cooley won the Big East conference tournament in 2014, which led to the program’s second tournament title in its history. This season, Providence started 14-3 overall and 6-0 in conference play before struggling down the stretch en route to a first-round NCAA tournament exit to Kentucky, 61-53.
Also Monday, ESPN 100 prospect Garwey Dual told ESPN he is decommitting from Providence and reopening his recruitment. A 6-foot-5 shooting guard, Dual is ranked No. 37 in the 2023 class. He never signed a letter-of-intent in the fall despite committing to the Friars last summer.
Dual told ESPN he plans to completely reopen his recruitment and isn’t simply planning to follow Cooley to Georgetown.
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