Tag Archives: Mike Jackson

Providence Adds Former HS Coach Ivan Thomas to Coaching Staff, Former Big East Commish Mike Tranghese to be Senior Advisor for Basketball

Providence announced on Monday that they are making some additions to their basketball program staffs. The one that was rumored to be in the works for some time now is Ed Cooley bringing Ivan Thomas into the fold as the Associate Director of Player Development and Video Operations. Thomas moves into Kevin Kurbec’s role as Kurbec slides up into the Coordinator of Basketball Operations role previously held by Mike Jackson. Kurbec served a similar role under Tim Welsh from 2005-08. Jackson is no longer with the Providence program. It has long been believed that Jackson wants to get more into the athletic department side of college basketball and is working towards that.

The part of the announcement that came as a bit of a surprise is that Providence is bringing former Big East commissioner Mike Tranghese back into the fold at Providence as a Senior Advisor for Basketball. Tranghese is currently part of the College Football Playoff committee, though he is expected to step down from that post after the current college football season ends. Tranghese “will assist Athletics Director Bob Driscoll with a variety of items involving the College’s basketball programs,” according to the release sent out by Providence’s athletic department.

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Ed Cooley Hires Jeff Battle as Assistant Coach

Ed Cooley called upon a close friend to replace former associate head coach Bob Simon by reaching out to Jeff Battle. Simon took the associate head coach position at Alabama under newly hired head coach Avery Johnson on April 19th. Battle was out of coaching this past year after being at Wake Forest for 13 years as the associate head coach for 3 different head coaches. Battle joins associate head coach Andre LaFleur and assistant coach Brian Blaney to make up Cooley’s 3 recruiting assistant coaches. The terms of Battle’s contract with Providence were not released.

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#pcbb Links of the Day 4/21/15

Potential Candidates to Replace Bob Simon

With associate head coach Bob Simon leaving Providence to join newly hired Avery Johnson’s coaching staff at Alabama there is now an open spot on Ed Cooley’s staff. That open spot is a big one as Simon was a tireless recruiter for Cooley and a very good X & O coach. I’m a little disappointed Simon left Providence for a lateral title and not to be a head coach but being the associate head coach for an SEC school will likely help his head coaching prospects. Simon also probably got a nice pay increase from that football money and that money will go farther down in Alabama than it would in Rhode Island.

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Cox Sports: Friar Carson Desrosiers’ scare factor #pcbb