“Isn’t everybody sick of me by now?”
To Jay Wright, this seems like a logical question. On a bitter cold December afternoon, Villanova University’s former men’s basketball coach is headed to Idaho to cover a college hoops game between Boise State and Washington State as part of his job with CBS Sports. Since retiring in 2022, the Hall of Famer has been putting himself out there locally as well, whether it’s on campus—where he serves as a special assistant to Villanova president Father Peter Donohue—on the golf course with alumni, or at just about every event supporting the Augustinians.
As the media ramps up for this year’s NCAA Tournament, Wright will once again be a major presence. Instead of prowling the sidelines in his meticulously tailored suits, he’ll be in the TNT studio providing analysis and trying to remain professional as Charles Barkley and Kenny Smith try to lead him astray. During the regular season, he does a game every weekend for CBS. “It’s still new enough for me that I get excited about going to different campuses,” says Wright, who won national championships at Villanova in 2016 and 2018. “Last year, we did a game at Indiana, and I never coached there or played there.”
Whether he’s in the studio or on site, Wright is there to break down the game and provide the kind of insights only coaches can. “He’s charismatic,” says Harold Bryant, CBS Sports’ executive producer, perhaps stating the obvious. “He doesn’t talk down to the audience—he talks to the audience. It’s not easy to teach that. It feels like you want to sit down with him and watch a game.”
As you might imagine, Wright is his own toughest critic. “I’m trying to find my voice,” he says. “I don’t want to get complicated with Xs and Os, but if I see some things interesting to me, I’m trying to simplify that for the people watching at home. I want to explain what’s going on and describe the uniqueness of the coaches.”
Since Wright generally does Saturday games, his weeks are pretty set. He flies in on a Thursday, watches practice on Friday and, after production meetings, heads off to dinner with a crew that includes legendary broadcaster and night owl Bill Raftery, a fixture of CBS college hoops broadcasts since 1983. The two have been friends for a few decades, and their on-air rapport benefits from that. “I don’t think Jay had any acclimation period [to broadcasting], to be honest with you,” Raftery says. “His personality and experience are pretty extraordinary, and his people skills are above the norm.”
Despite two national NCAA titles, Wright’s Wildcats exited 14 times without the trophy. Now, Wright can experience March Madness without the pressure and the almost inevitable disappointment of being on the court. “When you lose that [last tournament] game, you’re devastated, crushed, until the tournament is over,” Wright says. “We were lucky two years that we didn’t feel that.”
On the TNT set, the Wright-Barkley connection is real. Their friendship goes back to the mid-1980s, when Barkley was playing for the 76ers and Wright was assisting Rollie Massimino at Villanova. The two spent plenty of time together at nightlife haunts like Al E Gators in Haverford. “No one ever knows where it’s going when we’re on the air, but we always make it fun,” says Wright.
Though he plans to continue his broadcasting duties, Wright isn’t looking to expand his workload. He’ll be a continued presence at Villanova, assisting the president, lecturing at the business school and addressing alumni and donors. He also attends Wildcats basketball games.
Meanwhile, he’ll continue to grow in his TV role. Bryant notes that Wright’s team-first mentality has been crucial to his development. “He wasn’t a ‘beat you down’ kind of coach—he was a ‘lift you up’ kind of guy,” Bryant says. “That translates well to TV.”
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