Villanova's slick coach proves he has the Wright stuff

By Kevin Armstrong, SI.com

Villanova's Jay Wright has brought the Wildcats back to the Top 25 with his master recruiting. AP

VILLANOVA, Pa. -- To understand Jay Wright's strengths as a promoter, you need to go back to one evening at Philadelphia's 30th Street Station during the spring of 1984.

Wright's first job out of college was in marketing for the Philadelphia Stars of the newly formed United States Football League. Peddling spring-time football to a difficult audience, he spent most days cold-calling potential season-ticket buyers from an office in Veterans Stadium and visiting Knights of Columbus halls. This assignment was different, though. During rush hour, he joined team cheerleaders, including his future wife, Patricia Reilly, for a publicity event. The Stars' mascot failed to show up, so Wright donned the furry, gold costume and served as a one-man constellation, pressing brochures into commuters' palms.

"[I figured] no one was ever going to know," Wright said. "We were just selling."

The salesman in Wright, who left the Stars to take an assistant coaching position at the University of Rochester the next year, is very much alive. Over the last two decades, he has sold recruits on Rochester, Drexel, Villanova, UNLV and Hofstra. Wright, 46, has done everything from bridging gaps between AAU power brokers and high school coaches, to wooing recruits with the bells and whistles of the Wachovia Center to flying 14 hours to West Africa to meet a recruit's parents to eating KFC on former Wildcats guard Randy Foye's porch in Newark, N.J. "Jay can sell sand to an Arab or red, white and blue to Bin Laden," said Rochester's Mike Neer, the first coach to hire Wright. "You can't say no."

Adds Julius Evans, whose brother, Tyreke, was courted by Wright before committing to Memphis in April: "He never shook my hand. He hugged me every time."

Last month, Wright, coming off a career-best coaching effort in leading an inexperienced team to an unexpected run to the Sweet 16, signed three of the nation's top 60 seniors. Rated the Big East's best class, it draws from near (point guard Maalik Wayns of Philadelphia), far (forward Mouphtaou Yarou of Africa) and the mid-Atlantic (swingman Isaiah Armwood of Baltimore). Throw in Duke transfer Taylor King -- a 6-7, 215-pound forward who must sit out this season -- and the class resembles his 2002 haul -- which included Foye, McDonald's All-American Jason Fraser, Curtis Sumpter and Allan Ray.

"[Jay] builds relationships," said St. Joseph's coach Phil Martelli, Wright's Big Five rival. "He's engaging and interested in knowing you, whether you're a writer or a truck driver. We all should have that ability but we don't."

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Not everything is as it appears with Wright. Shortly after Villanova coach Rollie Massimino hired him as an assistant in the spring of 1987, Massimino took the staff to dinner at his favorite Italian restaurant and introduced his minions to ownership as all paisan. Later, Wright informed Massimino that he is actually of Irish, German and French ancestry -- and not, despite what his dark perfectly-coiffed hair and complexion might suggest -- Italian. "Don't tell anyone that," Massimino said. "You're one of us."

No matter the heritage, there's toughness to Wright's olive skin. Born Jerold Taylor Wright Jr., to Jerry, a power tools pitchman and Judy, a homemaker, his family lived in Allentown, Pa., before moving to Churchville, outside Philadelphia, when he was five. Sheltered in the suburbs, he started going by Jay and broke out of the Bucks County bubble for runs at the Sonny Hill League in rugged North Philadelphia following sophomore year at Council Rock High. One day the passenger side door was stripped from his light-chocolate Capri; another time there was a bullet hole through a window.

"Do you have to go?" asked his mother.

"It's the only place I can get better," he said.

When his father sat in the stands, people joked, "I know which one is your kid."