Borges: Is Providence College becoming heated rival for UConn men’s basketball team? Depends on who you ask

[Kolumbo]

Our greatest rivals in basketball rotated between Georgetown, Syracuse, Villanova, St. John's. Artest, Barkley, Postell, Thornton, Lopez, Hamilton. SJU had quite a run there during our first national championship team era. The rivalry was so heated that coach Jarvis moved the games to midweek because UCONN owned MSG on the weekends. PC never reached that level but who knows.

 

[August_West]

PC jumping up and down saying they are our rival is trying to make fetch happen. It’s a very Rutgers vibe.

I was thinking more like its like UConn creating the civil ConFLiCT

LOL, a -23 reaction score?

You really have to work for that ratio. I'm a fan.

 

[CL82]

I was thinking more like its like UConn creating the civil ConFLiCT


You really have to work for that ratio. I'm a fan.

For the record UConn did not create the civil ConFLiCT. That was the lunatic Diaco. I sometimes wonder if it was secretly a world-class troll. Probably not, but that hideous trophy does make me wonder about it.

 

[Deepster]

I'm a PC alum from Connecticut that grew up a UConn fan when the program transitioned from a regional program to a national power. A "rivalry" can be established for a number of reasons. Certainly the pedigree of UConn's program is far superior to Providence's. But to ignore geographic proximity and conference alignment is ignorant in my opinion. I also find it fascinating- perhaps an indication of the age of some of these posters, that Pitt is an overwhelming choice as a "rival" because an intense, but short window. Syracuse makes sense- even though they're in the ACC now. Georgetown makes sense. Pitt does not to me. Perhaps its a bias, but people seem to ignore the massive success of the PC program in the 60s and 70s. It was by far the best program in New England back then and competed nationally and produced several top 3 overall NBA draft picks. Times change. Programs rise and fall. The collective on here can childishly dismiss PC as an irrelevant program or you could acknowledge that programs can become dumpster fires fairly quickly (see Syracuse, Georgetown, etc.) and heed that warning as you have a petulant child as your head coach. I respect the hell out of the UConn program. I was hoping your experience moving to the AAC and becoming insignificant would have brought more humility. As for PC, Cooley has them on the right track but the school will never finance the program enough to make it a national power. So if you are basing a rivalry strictly on national pedigree, PC will never be a rival to UConn. I for one, look forward to every UConn PC game because they're usually intense. As far as school rivals go, BC was by far the biggest rival across all sports when I was an undergraduate student there. Times change.

This whole thread bores me.

 

[That Guy]

We don't have any rivals anymore. It used to be Cuse, but they're not in the BE anymore and we don't play them in non-conference much either. It could've been Villanova going forward, but with Jay Wright retiring who knows what state that program will be in. As for Providence...don't make me laugh!

 

[Waquoit]

BTW, the Civil ConFLiCT was a fun idea. UCF sucks.

 

[CaptainRon]

Syracuse has historically had a bigger rivalry with Georgetown than us, so we're a secondary rival. But we think of them as perhaps our primary rival. We have other primary rivals, but PC fans think of us as a primary rival.

Don’t you actually have to play someone to be a rival?

 

[ClifSpliffy]

righteous tune.
u people should dance more.


righteous movie. the bandit won an oscar for it.

 

[Dream Jobbed 2.0]

Only on Twitter

 

[Dream Jobbed 2.0]

I consider Xavier more of a rival than PC currently after the epic game in Charleston right before we rejoined and a bunch of good games after we’ve been back in.

 

[ClifSpliffy]

good name.

 

[Waquoit]

I consider Xavier more of a rival than PC currently after the epic game in Charleston right before we rejoined and a bunch of good games after we’ve been back in.

An army of one

 

[NH Husky]

You can’t just fabricate rivalries.
Two things needed. Some historical bad blood and sustained period (10 to 15) years where both teams finished top 2 80% of the time for some achievement. (Best in State, best in New England, best in conference).
Dukey V was pushing that big time with UMass (Cal vs Cal) but UMass couldn’t sustain - I’d say there biggest rival was Temple.
And Nova? No bad blood - it’s hard to hate Jay.
I think our biggest potential rival aside from Syracuse is Boston College. If they ever came back in the Big East we would cry foul and absolutely hate them. And if they competed for titles it would really blow up. What a blast that would be.

 

[FfldCntyFan]

I've seen a few comments on kids not having ever played some of the schools listed as rivals (which is a fair point) but I don't believe that we will have anyone on the roster this upcoming season who has played PC as many times as we've played Creighton or Xavier.

 

[ccsuphanner]

Don’t overthink this. Syracuse is our rival. It does not matter how often we play them.

 

[buddy]

You can’t just fabricate rivalries.
Two things needed. Some historical bad blood and sustained period (10 to 15) years where both teams finished top 2 80% of the time for some achievement. (Best in State, best in New England, best in conference).
Dukey V was pushing that big time with UMass (Cal vs Cal) but UMass couldn’t sustain - I’d say there biggest rival was Temple.
And Nova? No bad blood - it’s hard to hate Jay.
I think our biggest potential rival aside from Syracuse is Boston College. If they ever came back in the Big East we would cry foul and absolutely hate them. And if they competed for titles it would really blow up. What a blast that would be.

I absolutely hate BC no matter which conference they are a member. They are not a rival. If they came back to the Big East it would be because the ACC threw them out and took UConn.

 

[Dean Wormer]

Somewhat. To have a true rivalry I think there also has to be a case where teams are perceived as winning meaningful victories. Providence really hasn’t done that. To be honest, other than this year‘s COVID assisted run, they really haven’t done much since Ernie DiGregorio.

So, for me at least, Providence is a collective “meh.” I want to win the games we play against them because they are a conference opponent, but that certainly not different then other conference teams. They aren’t a date I would circle on the schedule. The fact that it is for Providence fans is… nice for them, I guess.

I agree. I don’t see why some fans are so ready to create a PC rivalry out of thin air. When was the last regular season or BE tournament semi or championship game that we played vs PC?
They got better because the old BE blew up and most of the big dogs like Cuse, Pitt, and us moved on.
Now that we’re back, maybe a rivalry happens. But to think that right now PC is anywhere close to being a rival because we had a big crowd at home last year is ludicrous. Give it a couple of years maybe, but all you PC lurkers need to accept you are, and always will be, little brother. Prove me wrong.

 

[HuskyHawk]

Providence can pretend to be a rival, while they worship at the altar that is the UConn Dairy Bar

 

[8893]

Providence can pretend to be a rival, while they worship at the altar that is the UConn Dairy Bar

I mean, they’re not stupid.

 

[Dean Wormer]

I mean, they’re not stupid.

I beg to differ. What’s the old saying? Even a broken clock is right twice a day!

 

[NH Husky]

I agree. I don’t see why some fans are so ready to create a PC rivalry out of thin air. When was the last regular season or BE tournament semi or championship game that we played vs PC?
They got better because the old BE blew up and most of the big dogs like Cuse, Pitt, and us moved on.
Now that we’re back, maybe a rivalry happens. But to think that right now PC is anywhere close to being a rival because we had a big crowd at home last year is ludicrous. Give it a couple of years maybe, but all you PC lurkers need to accept you are, and always will be, little brother. Prove me wrong.

I think maybe it could happen too. They just need to consistently be at the top. I do remember pre breakup they seemed to have our number (kinda like Creighton). Maybe linemen years. But not really bad blood. I like their coach too

 

[Chin Diesel]

PC is a rival but not a benchmark program. There is nothing has has now or has achieved in the past that UConn aspires to have.

The games are always filled with fans and if UConn fans donfill the seats, PC fans will.

As someone said earlier in this thread you get egg on your face for losing an no extra credit for winning.

 

[CONN78SEJ]

Is Providence College becoming heated rival for UConn men’s basketball team? Depends on who you ask

Are Providence College and UConn men’s basketball team Big East rivals? Coaches Dan...

www.nhregister.com

UConn and Hurley need more in conference rivalries than just Providence. The Big East needs coaches who can coach champions. When Calhoun and UConn started to be taken seriously in the early 90’s, the Big East had maybe the greatest collection of great coaches in the history of the game. I mean did any other conference in history have a better collection of coaching legends and future HOF’s than Calhoun, Rollie, John Thompson Sr, Nose Picker, Rick Barnes, Lou Carnesecca, PJ Carlisimo, Ralph Willard, and Leonard Hamilton? Compare those names to what we have in the Big East now.

 

[Huskymagic]

It’s Providence: nobody cares. UCONN can’t experience devolution by making Providence level programs our rival. There’s nothing there.

We need to make sure especially with Jay Wright leaving that we go back to our traditional roots as much as possible.

You don’t abandon great rivalries to make new forced imaginary rivalries.

UCONN admin, Dave Benedict needs to make sure we reignite our rivalry with Syracuse.

We also need to look at Pitt as well when Capel gets canned.

These are very important steps particularly with the new NIL era and mercenary portal era.

 

[Deadrody]

Wouldn't it have to be ANY kind of rivalry before it would become a "heated" rivalry ? How many national championships have the Friars won, exactly ?