Taking On High Expectations: A Conversation With Jay McAuley

“People now pronounce ‘Wofford’ the right way.” That’s the metric head coach Jay McAuley’s used to describe how far the men’s basketball program has progressed since he first came to the college as an assistant coach.

It was 2008, and McAuley was barely out of the University of Georgia, where he’d been a reserve guard and then worked as a student manager. Wofford was by no means a household name among college basketball enthusiasts. Led by Mike Young, who had been Richard Johnson’s assistant since 1989 before his promotion to head coach in 2002, the program was still trying to find its way on the Division I landscape when McAuley was brought onboard.

The Benjamin Johnson Arena had been a showplace in the NAIA era but looked like a high school gym compared to other venues in the Southern Conference. Salaries for the assistant coaches were anywhere from low to non-existent – McAuley served as a volunteer when he first started – and there wasn’t much in the way of administrative support staff.

“I was naïve – I couldn’t believe how different Wofford was to a place like UGA,” McAuley said.

On top of all that, the teams simply hadn’t been winning a whole lot. In the three seasons prior to McAuley’s arrival, Wofford went 11-18, 10-20, and 16-16.

McAuley was there for the turning point – the program’s first Southern Conference championship and trip to the NCAA Tournament. He then left to take a position on the staff at Gardner-Webb, followed by an assistant’s role at Furman, before returning to Wofford in 2017.

In the years while McAuley was away, a lot changed, of course. The program made three more trips to the NCAA Tournament and became established as a top-tier force in the Southern Conference. An aura of confidence had taken root among players, coaches, and fans. Construction of the Jerry Richardson Indoor Stadium, a stunning upgrade from the BenJo, promised even greater things ahead.

McAuley’s second two-year stint as an assistant saw Wofford grab regional and national headlines:  The Terriers defeated a top-10 UNC team in Chapel Hill. They beat Georgia Tech in Spartanburg on a spectacular game-winning shot by Fletcher Magee.  They hosted UNC at the JRIS. Magee set the NCAA three-point record. Wofford beat Seton Hall, getting the program’s first-ever NCAA Tournament win. (We fans know all this, of course, but it’s fun to recount, nonetheless!)

“You go into an airport now wearing Wofford gear, and people are like, ‘Yeah, Wofford – that’s Fletcher Magee’s school!’” McAuley said. “The notoriety has made a difference. Wofford is a household name now for mid-major basketball.”

McAuley understands what all this means. The program he took over in 2019, after Young left for Virginia Tech, has very high expectations. These days, breaking .500 in league play isn’t considered a sign of progress. Playing in the NCAA Tournament – even winning a game – no longer seems like a far-off dream.

McAuley’s job isn’t to inch toward competitiveness or turn a corner. It’s to maintain and build on success that has made Wofford the strongest program in the Southern Conference over the past decade.

McAuley clearly takes this responsibility seriously. He knows there’s pressure to win – and win the right way. But he doesn’t seem bogged down by the pressure.

The son of a schoolteacher mom and a dad who “was my first coach,” McAuley seems right in his element. He gets excited talking about the young guys he coaches and about building relationships with them and their families. He speaks with great admiration about the Wofford program – including Mike Young and his fellow members of Young’s coaching tree – and the college. And he’s got a clear sense of purpose about what needs to happen for Wofford basketball to continue to thrive.

I had a chance to talk recently with McAuley. I’m grateful for his time. We covered a range of topics, from his thoughts on this most unusual season to his longer-term vision for the program. Here are some of what I think are the highlights of our conversation:

(Note: The following interview has been edited and condensed in places for length and clarity.)

Baker Maultsby:  A very strange year for basketball, obviously. But your team has done a lot of good things, and on the ESPN+ broadcasts I watch on my laptop, it looks like they’re having fun.

Jay McAuley:  I like where we’re at. We’ve got a tough group, a together group. You know you’ve got something special when guys want to come into the gym everyday in February and work hard. It can become a grind at this point in the season. Winning helps, of course.

Aside from the pandemic, y’all had a lot of other changes in the offseason – a couple of key players graduating, a couple guys transferring, a lot of recruits arriving on the scene. How has the team come together this year?

It can be a tricky deal having a bunch of newcomers. Everyone was used to having a big role in high school. It’s a new situation, and roles have to be defined. Trust has to be gained over time.

The older guys have been raving about the chemistry this year – which you get a feeling of as a coach, but to hear it from older players really lets you know.  Even with our youth and mistakes we make sometimes, we keep pulling for each other, fighting for each other.  This group molded well together and has gotten closer and closer. We see it on road games – I think the guys like getting off campus a little bit.

For you, as the coach, it must mean a lot to have older players – like seniors Tray Hollowell and Storm Murphy – who came here to play for a different head coach be supportive of what you’re trying to do and helping to bring the younger guys along.

It’s been everything for me. They gave me a vote of confidence when the transition happened, which was important. But this isn’t about me. It’s about an unbelievable program – a program that does it the right way, that’s built on a first-class way of doing things and on togetherness.

The team has been impressive this season. You’ve exceeded most people’s preseason expectations. But you also had a couple lopsided losses recently (against East Tennessee and UT-Chattanooga). How do you and your staff respond to that? Do you try to just move on? Or does it cause you to think about retooling some things?

It’s a gut feeling, just like when make a play call or call a timeout. You have a feeling about your team, and you’re always trying to learn more.

Those two games we lost after an emotional, emotional fight with Furman. Those last eight minutes (against Furman) were some of the hardest fought minutes of basketball around here in a long time. I pushed the team harder to get even better that next week, but I should have reevaluated some things emotionally and physically – we were really spent. We couldn’t get it going. I was proud of how we played back at home against The Citadel.

For longtime fans like me, the evolution of Wofford’s basketball program is pretty unbelievable. Who could have imagined the success we’ve seen and having a home venue like the Richardson arena? At the same time, I do think a lot of Wofford fans identify with the idea of doing more with less, of being scrappy. Historically, that’s been kind of baked into the culture.

When I pull up to our beautiful arena everyday, I’m really humbled to walk into that building as head coach. I try to convey that humility to our players and staff. I point to times back at the Benjamin Johnson Arena – things were different – to make our guys truly appreciate what we have. I want our teams to embody what the college is all about – being scrappy, pulling for each other.

I also want to connect with all those people who feel pride about our program and the history and make sure they feel welcome. It’s hard now with the pandemic, but hopefully our play is showing that we’re carrying that torch this year.

We’re lucky to have what we have now. But it’s not good enough. We need to keep moving forward – not settle. You’ve got to be a problem-solver at Wofford. If you’re a professor or an administrator or a coach, you’ve got to realize you’re not going to always have the most.

Looking to next season and beyond, hopefully fans can come back to the home games. What would you hope the home court atmosphere will eventually be like? What would be ideal?

I just want a hybrid experience. I want families to bring their kids and feel good about the environment. Maybe it’s a 4 p.m. game and then they go to dinner to celebrate a win. I want it to be fun for students – standing up the whole time, pulling for the team, getting into it, making it the best home court advantage in conference. That’s what the arena was built for. We have the bells and whistles. We’ve got to get together as an athletic program and have got to be intentional with it. And, of course, there’s nothing better than winning.

It goes without saying that recruiting is a huge part of trying to build a winning program. Wofford has obviously recruited some terrific players over the years – Noah Dahlman, Cam Jackson, Fletcher Magee, and others – but has the program’s recent success helped open doors?

It’s helped us get in the mix with a lot of players. Sam Godwin is a great example. He saw us in the tournament, came out on a visit, and loved it here.

At the same time, we have to be more strategic on how we offer kids and when we offer. It used to be that we were the ones to offer scholarships to those diamonds in the rough. Now people think that if Wofford offers a scholarship, then the guy must be pretty good. So we’ve got to hold our cards a little.

At the ACC level, coaches are all pretty much recruiting the top 100 ranked recruits. And everyone knows that if such-and-such a team signs a top 10 recruit, then he’s probably going to be a handful for however long he’s in college. You don’t really have that kind of dynamic at the Southern Conference level, I’m guessing. How do you know that you’re recruiting a player who can really help your teams win?

It’s not an exact science. We look for kids who are smart. And did they win in high school? In AAU? Are they always in the gym? We look at their families. There’s a bunch of checklists.

And there may be a handful of guys we want who end up being too good and go to bigger schools. But we swing for the fences.

If you hadn’t gotten into coaching, what do you think you’d be doing?

That’s a good question. I’ve never really thought of that. I have a twin brother in pharmacy, another brother who is a physical therapist. My dad was my first coach and mom’s a teacher, so I’d probably be doing something in education.

Really, I’d be trying to spend more time with my two daughters and my wife. I’d be playing more golf and going to some live concerts.

OK – who are some of your favorite bands?

I’m a huge Pearl Jam fan, Neil Young, Tom Petty. My dad got me onto those. Coach Young and I had that in common – we love seeing live music.

How has it been for your family to be back here in Spartanburg?

We love it…the schools are great. It’s why we came back here, to be honest. This is a special place. It’s something my wife wanted to do – because of the community. And you’re always running into Wofford people who love it. I’ve been other places where not everyone has that genuine love for the teams.