NCAA Basketball: 10 best head coaching hires of 2023 offseason

1. Ed Cooley (Georgetown)

Things have not been pretty at Georgetown in recent years, even under the leadership of Hall of Famer and Hoya legend Patrick Ewing. The Hoyas shockingly won the Big East Tournament in 2021 but have been at or under. 500 in all but one of the last eight seasons, a major step down from this program’s glory. The Hoyas made their first hire outside of the Georgetown family in some time, and they came up with one of the best snags of the entire coaching carousel.

It’s Cooley who begins his work in Washington DC though he’s certainly no stranger to winning in the Big East. He spent a long stint on Al Skinner’s staff at Boston College before beginning his head coaching career at Fairfield. It’s the last 12 seasons at Providence that made Cooley a hot commodity, winning a ton of games and leading the Friars to significant success, including seven trips to the NCAA Tournament.

After manufacturing success at one Big East programs, what’s to stop Cooley from doing the same thing at another one with more history and resources available? Cooley is a rising name in the coaching world and is responsible for Providence’s recent rise. There’s certainly reasons to believe that an established head coach like Cooley can turn things around for the Hoyas after faltering under Ewing’s leadership. Could this be the start of another dominant era of Hoyas basketball?

We’ve looked at ten of the best offseason coaching hires from this college basketball season. Do you agree with the hires we’ve selected and the order we’ve ranked them in or did we miss someone? Time will tell how each of these hires work out in the long run.