April 20, 2023
Locked on Women’s Basketball: Providence head coach Erin Batth is ready to awaken a sleeping giant
By The Next
Howard and Erin Batth talk about preparing for her first season with the Friars
Host Howard Megdal is back for another episode of the Locked on Women’s Basketball podcast. Providence coach Erin Batth is his guest. The two talk about her storied career as an assistant everywhere from Michigan to NC State, and her big plans to turn the Friars into a powerhouse in the BIG EAST Conference. Clemson legend Batth discusses her path, what she plans for her play style, and how being a Black woman in coaching has shaped both her career and the way she approaches the job she’s in now.
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Why this job and why now? Batth explained how she decided to take on this latest challenge after 17 years as an assistant coach.
“17 years, it’s a long time, but all through that journey, I was taking bits and pieces from the coaches and all the winning really goes down to those head coaches as well and how they’ve led and how they’ve taught us, myself, and my colleagues and their assistant coaches have given us an opportunity to grow as well,” Batth said. “When you know, you know, and after that my great, awesome time with KBA [coach Kim Barnes Arico] at Michigan and those wonderful women I got a chance to coach she really helped me and you know, this is it, you can do this. And so it was really a mixture of all kinds of, of just experiences, feelings, prayers, that I went, you know, just all kinds. This was it was, the right fit, what Steve [Napolillo] was looking for and his next head coach, I really feel like I fit the bill.”
She comes into a stacked BIG EAST that sent five teams to the NCAA Tournament last year in UConn, Vilanova, Creighton, St. John’s and Marquette.
“If you want to become a pro, you need to be playing and you need to be tested,” Batth said. “There should be no rest time. You should be you should have that feeling in your soul. Every evening. And I think that is amazing. Yes. I do think that is going to spearhead and get us going. Period. So yes, I would love that. I don’t want to go and beat a team by 50 every night, but I want to play I want to really, you know, get after it. And I think it makes it exciting and it makes it good for women’s basketball.”
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The two also discussed some more of her specific coaching strategy as she approaches her first season with the Friars.
“We have already worked on the toughness, part of being playing defense and the physicality and being okay to get hit and giving one if so,” Batth said. “I think it’s gonna be a mixture of all kinds of things. I do what I would like to press a little bit, just slow the ball down just a little bit, nothing too crazy. But just take some time off the clock. Some things we’ve been thinking about with the team and the women that we have now, we do have some length. So I think we could really benefit in using that. But I do, you know, I’m gonna take a lot from here and there.”
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