Providence Basketball: 10 candidates to replace Ed Cooley as head coach

Ryan Odom

We don’t know for sure which direction Providence will look, especially if their top options turn them down, but the Friars could find their next coach in the MWC. You might wonder why the head coach all the way out at Utah State would be a good fit over in Providence, but there’s a lot more about Odom’s background than just these last two seasons with the Aggies.

He’s a former college point guard and son of a coach, as his father was previously head coach at Wake Forest and South Carolina many years ago. He was a longtime assistant at Virginia Tech and has been head coach at three different schools, most notably leading 16-seed UMBC to that historic upset win over Virginia back in 2018. After a slow first season at Utah State, Odom led the Aggies back to the NCAA Tournament this year after a very impressive season and he may be ready to head back to his familiar stomping grounds on the east coast.

Odom has won important games at three different schools, also spending a season at D2 Lenoir-Rhyne, and is certainly a name on the rise in the coaching world. The jump from a strong mid-major league like the Mountain West to the Big East isn’t as major as some of these other hires would be, though he has no direct connections to Providence or the Big East itself. It wouldn’t be a bad hire but it might come a little out of left field, especially with the pedigrees of some of these other coaches.