Little Ricky and The Meatball

In 1985, Providence College hired Rick Pitino to be to be the head coach for its Men’s Basketball program, replacing legendary coach Joe Mullaney. Mullaney had made Providence a New England and National hoop powerhouse, leading the Friars to NIT titles in 1961 and 1963, as well as nine 20 win seasons. Mullaney left Providence as its all-time winningest coach with 319 victories, but in the 1984-85 season, the Friars could only muster 11 wins versus 20 losses in his final season. One of the players on that ’84-85 team was Billy Donovan.

Billy Donovan arrived at Providence in 1983 as a player with good ball handling skills and a nice shot, but a bit on the chunky side. He looked like a meatball. I remember thinking to myself, why is Mullaney recruiting short, fat kids to play at Providence? He must be losing it. In his first two seasons at PC, Donovan averaged 2.3 and 3.2 points per game respectively. The kid didn’t seem to have much of a future and neither did the PC basketball program. That all changed when Rick Pitino was hired to be the head coach of the Friars.

Pitino was coming off a two-year stint as an assistant coach with the New York Knicks of the NBA, and prior to that was head coach at Boston University for five years. PC was definitely a step up for the young coach and it was an opportunity for him to demonstrate his ability at the Big East level. Pitino preached hard work and an up tempo style of basketball that soon became his trademark. A by-product of Pitino’s system was the transformation of Billy Donovan from meatball to serious basketball player. Seemingly for the first time in his basketball career, a coach challenged Donovan to work harder than he had ever worked before and to make himself into a real basketball player. Donovan accepted the challenge and the results were life changing. Billy the Kid was the main cog in Pitino’s two seasons at Providence, averaging 15.1 points per game in his junior year and 20.6 in his senior year, but the longer lasting impression was the one he made on his coach.

The 1986-87 college basketball season was the first in which the 3-point line became official for all NCAA games (some conferences had experimented with it prior to 1986). The 3-point shot became another hallmark of Rick Pitino coached teams and the ’86-87 Friars were well equipped to take advantage of the new rule. They did so to the tune of a Final Four appearance in New Orleans before they were derailed by Big East rival Syracuse. Donovan shot over 41% from beyond the 3-point arc and was the undisputed leader/star of the team. He was Pitino’s floor general and the coach must have known that the kid’s career in basketball would go far beyond his playing days; he had a coach in the making.

Now it’s 2006 and Billy Donovan’s Florida Gators are National Champions. After several years as an assistant coach under his mentor Rick Pitino, Donovan has risen to the summit of his profession. Of course, there were criticisms along the way, but the UF basketball program is in good hands. Billy the Kid learned the value of hard work during his playing days at PC and now everyone associated with Gator basketball is reaping the rewards. It’s safe to say that none of this would have happened if he hadn’t met a certain young coach in 1985.