The city was buzzing and the Dunk was rocking. If you want the stats, check the box score. Cotton was great, Henton was great, Fortune hit a few big shots and Desrosiers protected the Tim. Batts was hot early.
The cardiac kids did it again. 20 wins. 20. Ed Cooley credited the crowd for willing them to win tonight. I tend to agree. I’m so glad I was there to see this one. Saturday would be nice but I’m just going to enjoy this one and go 1-0 tonight.
Line opened with Providence as a 3.5 point favorite and has since moved up to 4 points. My numbers (not inclusive of home court advantage, etc) have this game as a pick ’em. Kenpom sees the final score as 72-67 in favor of Providence.
ESPN’s Joe Lunardi came out with his new bracket today and he has PC as the 1st of the “First Four Out” category. Lunardi currently has a total of 3 Big East teams in with SJU and PC in the “First Four Out” and Georgetown in the “Next Four Out” category. It looks like, depending on how this last week of the regular season and the Big East Tournament go, the Big East could get as many as 6 in and as few as 3.
I’ll have a full Bracketology update on Thursday at noon as I do every week.
The Providence staff was down in Nashville on Tuesday night, along with a few other high majors, to check in on Braxton Blackwell (2016) who plays for CPA which is Jalen Lindsey’s old squad. CPA won the game PC attended, the region semifinals, and Blackwell scored 31 points. On Wednesday night, they played the 6-AA region finals and won to improve to 32-2 on the season. Blackwell scored 15 points in the win and was named the All-Region MVP. The 6’8 215 lbs (SF) 17th ranked player in the class of 2016 according to ESPN holds offers from Auburn, Cincinnati, Florida, Indiana (attended Hoosier Hysteria this year), LSU, Memphis, Mississippi St, N.C. State, Providence, Tennessee, Vanderbilt (his HS coach played there), Virginia and Virginia Tech. He also has interest from Kentucky, Michigan State and North Carolina. This would be the most impressive get if Cooley could somehow pull this off. He is a consensus top 30 player in the class of 2016 and has no ties to Rhode Island like Jalen Lindsey so getting him from Nashville to Providence would be a huge coup. So far he has visited Louisville (1/2/13 coincidentally when they played PC), Vanderbilt (9/4/13, 2/5/14), Memphis (9/20/13), Indiana (10/4/13 for Hoosier Hysteria) and Auburn (11/30/13).
The NEPSAC playoffs started on Wednesday and there are a lot of PC recruiting targets taking part in the action. Click here to see the names from Wednesday’s post. For results of Wednesday’s game click this link to the NERR.
Paschal Chukwu and the Fairfield Prep Stags finished the regular season undefeated (20-0) after winning at home against Hamden last Saturday night. It was Senior Night for Prep and Chuwku went for 21 points in the win. The next step will be the playoffs starting tomorrow morning 11am at Branford HS against Notre Dame-West Haven. Fairfield Prep handled ND-WH both times they met during the regular season by 15 and 16 points respectively. In national recruiting news, ESPN’s Adam Finkelstein lists Chukwu as one of his “Five Prospects Who Project Long Term”. He had this to say:
Line opened with Providence as a 2.5 point underdog and has since moved up to 3 points. My numbers (not inclusive of home court advantage, etc) have Providence as about a 2 point favorite. Kenpom sees the final score as 69-68 in favor of Seton Hall.
Trends
Providence is 4-1 in their last 5 ATS
Providence is 2-4 ATS in their last 6 road games at Seton Hall
The total has gone UNDER in 5 of Providence’s last 7 road games at Seton Hall
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