Pitt gets more than a good player with William Jeffress

The 2021-22 season had not gone well for coach Jeff Capel and the Pitt basketball program.

After a 66-46 loss to Boston College in the ACC Tournament — the last of a five-game, season-ending losing streak — Capel needed some encouragement. He was just beginning the process of exit interviews while sorting out in his mind what next season’s team would look like.

Then, William Jeffress walked into his office.

“He asked me questions first, just about how I was doing with everything that was going on,” Capel said Friday after practice.

“He immediately said he was staying, and he wanted to be a part of it. It was a big moment for me, for us and for our program. I wanted some guys to leave. I didn’t want him to leave.”

Now in his third season with the program, Jeffress isn’t starting, but he’s an important bench player on a team that has only nine healthy scholarship players.

When Jeffress came off the bench Wednesday night against Wake Forest, Pitt’s fortunes shifted. Faced with a 5-inch height shortage, Jeffress started getting physical with Wake Forest 7-footer Efton Reid, who suddenly stopped scoring. Pitt went on to record a 77-72 come-from-behind victory.

The game triggered Capel to recall the recruitment of Jeffress from Erie’s McDowell High School, the same school that sent James Conner to Pitt.

“He had a pretty big reputation in Erie, and it became national,” said Capel, who was all but counting the days until June 15, 2018, the first day college coaches could contact rising juniors. “We had heard about how amazing his family was.”

Mom had earned a PHD from Yale at the age of 22. Dad was known as “Dollar Bill” at the University of New Haven where he scored 1,354 points and blocked 172 shots.

Capel’s first call to Jeffress went to voicemail. The return call from Jeffress arrived — and continued — while Capel was wheeling a shopping cart around Giant Eagle, doing his family’s grocery shopping.

“We talked for a half-hour,” Capel said. “We tried to let him know how much we wanted him in our program. That was during a time when there wasn’t a lot good going on in our program.”

When Jeffress arrived at Pitt, he was only 16, having graduated early from McDowell after previously skipping a grade.

“Especially with his character, I thought he’d be a good player, a really good piece,” Capel said. “As I got to know him, I thought he had unbelievable character traits. I thought he would be a guy, as he got older, who possibly could become a really good leader. It’s been really cool to watch him grow in that role.”

Jeffress’ time at Pitt was marked by four starts during a covid-interrupted freshman season (2020-21) and a toe injury last year that kept him from joining the team during its run to the NCAA Tournament.

“It stinks that that first year was the covid year,” Capel said. “We didn’t get a chance to work with those guys at all that summer. It was just a weird time in life for everyone.”

During the summer of 2022, Jeffress got stronger and wiser in the ways of basketball and looked primed to have a good season. Capel liked what he saw of Jeffress during those summer workouts.

Then, he injured his toe.

“I felt really bad for him,” Capel said. “He had really, really worked that summer of ’22. His balance was better. He wasn’t falling all over the place. Gotten stronger. It was a blow to him, personally. It was a blow to us.”

After accepting his reality last season, he worked diligently at rehab and has become a fixture in Capel’s current rotation.

“I can’t imagine how difficult that would be to miss a season,” Capel said, “just the mental hurdles you have to go through.”

Jeffress graduated in December with a double major in psychology and communications.

“He’s a smart kid. He challenges himself academically,” Capel said. “He’s a deep thinker and a guy who has found his voice.”