http://www.sportsline.com/collegebasketball/story/11090242

10. Providence

The good: The Friars will have a coach for their opener against Northeastern, which seemed in doubt for a while. They took forever (and were rejected by some) before finally securing Drake’s Keno Davis. He’ll benefit from the return of Sharaud Curry, a gifted guard who averaged 15.3 points two seasons ago before missing almost all of last season with a broken foot.

The bad: The reason it took Providence so long to get a coach is because the program is limited relative to its league affiliation. Though Davis is getting paid, and there’s nothing wrong with that, can he ever reasonably expect to consistently compete in the top third of a league with Georgetown, Louisville, Connecticut, Pittsburgh, Marquette, Notre Dame, Syracuse, Villanova and West Virginia? The simple answer is that he cannot. But in fairness he does have a roster that could sneak into the top half of the league this season.

The bottom line: An unbelievable bit of trivia is that Providence remains the only original Big East member to never win a Big East regular-season title. Alas, there’s no reason to think that won’t be true this time next year, as well.