On March 20, 2023, Ed Cooley was on top of the men’s college basketball world and Georgetown men’s basketball was near the bottom.
Cooley, then-head coach of the Providence College Friars men’s basketball team, was one season removed from taking his hometown team to their first Sweet 16 and winning the Naismith college coach of the year award. The Hoyas, on the other hand, were languishing as a perennial Big East bottom-feeder — winning only two conference games in two seasons — and fired Patrick Ewing (CAS ’85), who was unable to replicate his success as a player as a coach.
Georgetown turned to Cooley in hopes of restoring the program to the heights it reached in the 1980s, when then-Head Coach John Thompson Jr. led the Hoyas to a national championship and perennial title contention.
Lee Reed, Georgetown’s athletic director, said Cooley fit the criteria university administrators were looking for in a head coach.
“I thought Coach Cooley was a really good bridge from where we had been to where we want to go,” Reed told The Hoya in an interview on the sidelines of Big East Media Day. “His ability to galvanize communities, to pull people together was part of the reason, but the other part of the reason was because he’s an elite coach.”
“I thought he was the best candidate for the position,” Reed added.
Cooley’s successes at Providence would not neatly translate into instant wins on the Hilltop though. Under Ewing, the Hoyas lost many of the relationships with area high schools and AAU teams that buoyed recruitment, and with the fanbase and student body.
Reed said these structural disadvantages prevented the team from being competitive, and rebuilding those connections was the greatest challenge he expected the new coach to face.
“I think the biggest thing the public didn’t understand or see was how much groundwork had to be laid in building, mending relationships and establishing new relationships,” Reed said.
Cooley now has two years at the Hilltop under his belt. Last year, he delivered the Hoyas’ best conference finish since 2015 in second place. After 12 years without a single Hoya being drafted to the NBA, Cooley developed two players, Thomas Sorber and Micah Peavy, into draft picks despite both entering the season off scouts’ radars. At the same time, Georgetown struggled down the stretch with injuries, and, despite a promising season, lost in the first round of the Big East tournament to DePaul University.
Cooley’s time at Georgetown has also seen massive changes to the landscape of college sports. Name, image and likeness (NIL) deals have transformed college sports and made it easier to build a team quicker than ever before, as players receive payment for playing for a specific program. This summer, college sports moved even closer to professionalism, as a settlement allowed universities to directly pay student-athletes. Similar lawsuits have removed the NCAA’s basic authority to regulate the amount of times a player transfers or how many years they can play college sports.
The Hoya sat down with Cooley earlier this offseason for an exclusive interview to discuss rebuilding in the changing landscape of college sports, his decision to come to Georgetown and the legacy of basketball on the Hilltop.
It’s Been So Long Since Last We Met
Entering his third year on the Hilltop, Cooley said he believed success was imminent but that he qualified winning as broader than just on-court results.
“My definition of winning is always different than the public’s, because everybody wants to win now. Everybody wants to be in the tournament,” Cooley told The Hoya. “But for me, as a leader, there’s different wins that I was going after.”
Cooley said winning on a longer-term scale required creating an infrastructure and culture around the team, which was absent when he arrived.
“I think it’s time to win year one, but what are you winning?” Cooley added. “There’s different ways to win. You gotta win a community. You gotta win a fanbase, former players, faculty, students, staff members, board members, alums.”
DePaul was in a very similar circumstance to when the Hoyas hired Cooley when they hired Chris Holtmann as their head coach in 2024, one year after Cooley’s hiring. Holtmann was also tasked with rebuilding a Big East program as college sports became more professionalized. At Big East Media Day, Holtmann said NIL has made building a program uniquely challenging.
“As you’re rebuilding a program, implementing your culture and having as many retainable players as possible is important,” Holtmann told The Hoya.
Last March and April, Georgetown played in the College Basketball Crown, an upstart challenger to the National Invitation Tournament for teams that didn’t reach March Madness. The transfer portal opened before the Crown began, and Cooley said the Hoyas played that tournament short-handed as players left and coaches balanced portal recruitment.
“It is an absolute shitshow,” Cooley told The Hoya in March.
He said his opinion hasn’t changed.
“It’s still a shitshow until Congress, God or a new higher power intervenes into this,” Cooley said.
Cooley said the paying of student-athletes was long overdue, though the current framework needs reform.
“I used the word for retribution for what should’ve been done 40, 50 years ago,” Cooley said. “I’ve been in this game long enough where we couldn’t take our kids out to buy lunch. You couldn’t buy them a coat. You couldn’t give them an extra pair of shoes or buy them a razor or a toothbrush or deodorant or soap — basic food, basic necessities — while the NCAA made millions of dollars.”
Thompson Jr. kept a deflated basketball in his office to remind players that their life extended beyond the sport. A deflated ball still sits in the team’s facility inside a glass display case.
Cooley said the changing NIL landscape is devaluing the role of college sports and harming student-athletes.
“I don’t think players should be bouncing around the country and not graduating,” Cooley said. “Graduation rates, the next time they come out, are going to be piss-poor. At the end of the day, what are we doing? What is it that we are selling in higher education? It’s a travesty that so many young men and women are not going to have a degree.”
The Big East, along with the other Division I conferences, has endorsed the SCORE Act, a proposal which would shift the balance of power towards the NCAA and permit regulation of the transfer portal.
Cooley said player development is core to building a winning infrastructure, but it has become harder as players can transfer freely instead of playing for one coach and with one set of teammates for four years.
“We have a veteran, established staff that identifies prospects that fit the way I want to play. Ultimately, I think our secret sauce is player development,” Cooley said.
Cooley added his general approach to development hasn’t changed in the portal era, but players are limiting their growth by bouncing between colleges.
“We can always work on our weaknesses, but — I’m a believer — if you work on that strength and you master that strength, that will come out. That will allow you to develop and work on the things that you’re not great at,” Cooley said.
“When we’re recruiting — even though it could be a one-and-done guy, whether via the portal and/or a talented player — maximize them when they’re here,” Cooley added. “If you’re fortunate to retain them, you’ll see dramatic growth in their development.”
Lie Down Forever, Lie Down
Cooley’s departure from Providence remains a bitter sore spot for Friar fans, many of whom felt he was destined to become a legendary coach for his hometown team. Providence fans have been vocally hostile toward Cooley at every opportunity since, including in the Hoyas’ two games at the Friars under Cooley. Even the Providence athletic director, Steve Napolillo (SCS ’23), said he felt betrayed.
Providence has one of the most passionate and engaged fan bases and student sections across the sport, and their base turned on Cooley each time he returned. Online, the outrage was constant.
Providence forward Oswin Erhunmwunse said his team’s fans’ devotion is intense, but a huge boon when they are on your side.
“I think we have the best fanbase in the country,” Erhunmwunse told The Hoya at Big East Media Day. “It strikes fear for sure.”
Friar guard Corey Floyd Jr. agreed, saying the Providence student section is terrifying to opponents.
“It is one of, if not the, toughest environment to come in to play in all of college basketball,” Floyd told The Hoya.
Cooley said outside noise does not bother him, but he feels Providence fans should be grateful for the Friars’ growth and success during his tenure.
“I don’t think it affects me at all,” Cooley said. “I would never judge anyone who made a change, but that’s their prerogative. But I also wouldn’t be real if I didn’t say where were we in 2011 at Providence? And where were we in March 2023? You can’t erase history.”
Cooley’s daughter graduated from Georgetown in 2023 and continues to work in the region. Cooley said he appreciated being able to spend more time with family at Georgetown than he could at Providence and that, while proud of his time at Providence, moving to Georgetown was the logical next step in his life and career.
“We did it together, and it was just time to say, ‘I’m moving in a different direction,’” Cooley said. “People are going to have their opinions. People are going to have whatever they want to say, and I respect that, but it doesn’t change what I feel. It doesn’t change what I want to do.”
“That’s why it’s called a democracy, right? Choice,” Cooley added. “I’m going to do what’s in the best interest of my family.”
Rebuilding Georgetown, Cooley said, was an entirely different challenge than what he faced at Providence.
“The culture now is totally different,” he said. “The biggest change in our sport has been the portal and NIL, so the expectation is to win sooner.”
Reed, Georgetown’s athletic director, said he was happy with Cooley’s leadership so far and felt hiring him put the team in position to be competitive very soon.
“It was going to take some time, so we had to put together a roster,” Reed told The Hoya. “Last year we were trending in a really good direction.”
Reed added that he was proud of the impression Cooley has left on Georgetown’s identity.
“We have a team that looks like an Ed Cooley, meaning we’re deep, we’re physical, we’re more experienced and our basketball IQ has gone up,” Reed said.
There Goes Old Georgetown
Cooley’s hiring was a break from four decades of Georgetown basketball tradition. While the sport had significantly changed, which only accelerated in the last years of the Ewing era, Georgetown’s head coach selection remained incredibly consistent. All three Hoya coaches between Thompson Jr. and Cooley — Craig Eshrick, John Thompson III and Ewing — were directly connected to Thompson Jr., and the program continued in his shadow. His legacy persists.
Thompson Jr.’s name graces the court the Hoyas play on and the facility they practice in, and his quotes adorn the athletic center’s walls. It is unsurprising that administrators would look to him as a model of success on the Hilltop. Every coach after him and before Cooley was directly connected to Thompson Jr., but none were able to replicate his success.
Cooley said that, while he has enormous respect for his predecessors, it takes a different style to be successful today than it did in the 1980s.
“I don’t want to be like them,” Cooley said. “I respect them. I’ll do it in a different way. I’ll do it the best that I can. I feel zero pressure because of that.”
“I’m going to respect tradition. I’m going to respect the legacy of this place. We need to modernize Georgetown men’s basketball,” Cooley added.
Under Thompson Jr., the Hoyas played the supervillain role in college basketball, shutting themselves off from the media and the outside world. The atmosphere of secrecy around the team gave rise to its own coinage: Hoya Paranoia.
Cooley said Hoya Paranoia served its purpose, but he sought to bring in the wider Hilltop community as he leads a rebuild.
“It was something that was needed, but we are evolving into something different,” Cooley said. “It’s important for people to see who we are, not just as athletes, but as people.”
“I’m a gatherer of people,” he added.
Georgetown’s student attendance at men’s basketball games has long been among the lowest in the Big East. Capital One Arena is one of the conference’s venues farthest from its school’s campus, and making that journey became less attractive when there was little chance of on-court results.
Cooley said building up student support through events like dollar beer nights is directly tied to the team’s success, and he is prioritizing it at Georgetown.
“It’s the reason I’m on campus a lot — shaking babies and kissing hands — letting people know that we’re here together. We have to do this together,” Cooley said.
“We arrive together. We grow together. We move together,” he added.
Villanova University Head Coach Kevin Willard first met Cooley when they were head coaches in the Mid Atlantic Athletic Conference (MAAC). Willard and Cooley got their head coaching starts at Iona College in 2007 and Fairfield College in 2006, respectively, both MAAC schools. The two have been friends ever since.
Since then, both have climbed the coaching ladder and now are competing head coaches in the Big East. Willard said he thinks Cooley is one of the best coaches in the country, alongside Purdue University coach Matt Painter.
“He’s one of my very dear friends in this business,” Willard told The Hoya. “He’s probably the best tactical offensive coach that there is in college basketball. I put him up there with Matt Painter.”
“If they need to get a shot for a certain guy, he’s got a play for it. He knows how to call it. He knows how to run it,” Willard added.
Cooley said he views Georgetown as a program that should be annually contending in the Big East and nationally, and is working to restore the team to that position.
“When people talk to me, they use the word ‘if’ a lot,” Cooley said. “I’m one of the most optimistic people you’ll ever be around. ‘If’ is a nonstarter to me in life. The word is ‘when.’”
“It’s just a matter of time,” he added.
However, Cooley’s goals for this season are clear. He said he expects Georgetown to reach March Madness this season.
“Going into year three, our expectations are to be a tournament team, to compete for a Big East championship and to elevate the program,” Cooley said.
