Bucknell University Athletics
Bucknell Alum Jay Wright Leads Villanova to Final Four
4/3/2009 8:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
April 3, 2009
LEWISBURG, Pa. -- Under the direction of 1983 Bucknell graduate Jay Wright, the Villanova men's basketball team has returned to national prominence. Since arriving at Villanova in 2001, Wright helped the Wildcats reach a number of milestones, including a then-school-record 28 wins in 2005-06, a Big East regular-season title, a first-ever No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament and an Elite Eight trip in 2006. All of that gets surpassed this weekend, however, when Wright leads his Villanova team into the Final Four at Ford Field in Detroit.
The Wildcats (30-7), who are in the Final Four for the first time since their improbable national championship run as a No. 8 seed in 1985, will face North Carolina on Saturday at approximately 8:45 p.m. ET.
Wright was a three-year letterman at Bucknell, where he received the Benton A. Kribbs Award as team MVP in 1981-82 and the Musser Award for Leadership in 1982-83. He was the team's leading scorer (11.9 ppg) as a junior and served as team co-captain as a senior.
This week, Rich Hofmann at the Philadelphia Daily News tracked down former Bison coach Charlie Woollum to reflect on Wright's Bucknell days, and Bill Bowman at The Daily Item did the same with Tommy Thompson, who coached Jay on the junior varsity and was a varsity assistant under Woollum.
Wright, who brought his Villanova team back to the Bucknell campus in December of 2005 for a game that was played in front of the largest crowd in school history, was the head coach at Hofstra for seven seasons before taking the Villanova position. He has also been an assistant coach at Villanova and UNLV.
Also of note, Wright is not the first Bucknell alum to coach a college basketball team to the Final Four. That honor goes to Alvin "Doggie" Julian '23, who led Bob Cousy and Holy Cross to the national championship in 1947 and another national semifinal appearance in 1948. Julian is enshrined in the National Basketball Hall of Fame.
