Jan. 12, 2007
The Nova Notebook, by Villanova director of media relations Mike Sheridan, appears each Friday from September through February and monthly from April through August. This week we spend time with Villanova senior forward Will Sheridan.
SYRACUSE - As he walked into Villanova's breakfast here in the Wildcats' team hotel on Friday morning, it didn't take long for coach Jay Wright to spot Will Sheridan.
"Happy birthday, Bumper," stated Wright. "22 years old."
Sheridan gracefully accepted the congratulations of his coach and other team officials in the meeting room. Yet there was little fanfare, which seemed perfectly in keeping with the understated basketball career the 6-8 forward from Bear, Del., has crafted for himself at Villanova.
"I don't really feel older," he said later in the day, following the Wildcats return to the hotel from a brisk two hour practice at the Carrier Dome in preparation for Saturday's encounter with Syracuse. "It's just another day."
Indeed, Sheridan's gaze is aimed in only one direction these days. The spring semester does not begin until next week and the product of the Sanford School is on target for graduation in the spring. It will be his final semester prior to graduation in May so he can point most of his daily energy to the task of helping to lead a squad that features 10 freshmen and sophomores.
"Right now, my primary focus is this basketball team and trying to help make it the best team it can be," he states.
Sheridan's statistical contributions in 2006-07 are more modest than spectacular. He averages 6.7 points and 5.4 rebounds per game for the 11-4 Wildcats and has started all 15 games entering play this weekend. Yet numbers fail to do justice to all that he brings to the Wildcats. Wright lauded his defensive work on Georgetown's Roy Hibbard in the Jan. 8 win at Georgetown and often cites the ways Sheridan's attitude helps the `Cats. Mike Nardi always politely points out to questioners that 2005-06 wasn't only about four guards, but also a stout forward who did much of the dirty work that helped sustain the starting five.
"You can't forget the contribution Will Sheridan made," Nardi says. "He was a big part of what we were able to do."
Sheridan has never shied away from battling taller or heavier interior athletes since coming to the Main Line. His effort against Hibbard is only the latest example of his rugged tenacity in the paint.
"First and foremost, Casiem Drummond came off the bench to give me a lot of help and it really was a team effort," he noted. "But in general, I like playing against bigger guys. It's not easier but the good thing is that you know where they are going to be. So I just concentrate on trying to play harder."
Of course, Sheridan is fast approaching the twilight of his tenure at Villanova. The regular season is more than 50 percent complete and only weeks separate him from Senior Night. He concedes that, like most of those college seniors who must contemplate their future, it does cross his mind.
"I think about it every day," he says. "I feel like I have invested so much in this program. When I was in high school I was thinking about what I would need to do to be successful once I got here. It's more than just games and practices - it's strength and conditioning work, individual workouts and so many things that the average person may not see. I have tried to pour energy into everything to help make us a better basketball program. It kind of consumes you."
It would be hard to quibble with the results. Sheridan has been at the center of a basketball revival that has produced visits to the NCAA Tournament Sweet 16 and the Final Eight, along with a BIG EAST regular season title. He was there when Villanova had to rally to reach the National Invitation Tournament in 2004 and then played a huge role (13 points, 10 rebounds) in last February's defeat of No. 1 Connecticut at the Wachovia Center, among other highlights of his sophomore and junior seasons.
Much was tossed Sheridan's way early in his career and he has accepted every challenge.
"I felt like I was experienced about five games into my career," says Sheridan, who carried a huge interior load in 2003 as Villanova dealt with a series of suspensions owed to the telephone access code situation. "I averaged like 43 minutes a game because of the situation and felt like I could handle almost anything after that."
He can't help but draw a contrast between his entry into college basketball and those of his current, younger teammates.
"The experience these guys are having is very different from the one we came into," Sheridan says. "When my class came in, we were kind of thrown right into things. There weren't many expectations. Now, it's totally different. These young guys came to a program that had experienced success and they are being asked to sustain it with a lot more expectations than we faced."
Sheridan and fellow captains Nardi and Curtis Sumpter have spent countless hours explaining and accenting the message delivered to the young `Cats by Wright. They are constantly encouraging, cajoling, convincing and expressing to the underclassmen exactly how a Villanova basketball player conducts himself.
"We do feel a responsibility to show the young guys what this is all about," states Sheridan. "They have been sponges, listening and absorbing the things we have talked about. Now, I think people are starting to see the results of that. We are trying to blend old and new and we've had a few setbacks. But I think we are definitely moving in the right direction and have responded well to our bits of adversity."
Perhaps no quality better defines Sheridan's Villanova career than selflessness. He does not grumble about shots or his role in the offense. He is here to contribute in whatever way the coaching staff sees fit. It is an old school approach from a thoroughly modern man.
Sheridan's interests beyond basketball are varied. He reads a variety of books and has performed his "Spoken Word" at each of the last two Villanova Student-Athlete shows. Last summer, he was a part of the committee that helped plan the inauguration of incoming university president, Rev. Peter Donohue and then served as one of two student masters of ceremony at a kickoff gala in Philadelphia. He also wrote a column in the Philadelphia Daily News during Villanova's March 2006 NCAA Tournament march.
Those who know him could see him in a variety of prominent roles when his basketball career concludes. Yet Sheridan isn't quite ready to ease into one of those avenues just yet.
"I definitely plan to pursue basketball professionally," he says. "After that, I'm not exactly sure which direction I will go."
He will not lack for opportunities.
For now, however, it is all about writing both a conclusion and legacy to his Villanova career.
