‘Wags’ was one special official
Acoach-official relationship during a basketball game at any level can sometimes be, shall we say, adversarial? But not when Jeff Wagner officiated.
“You talk to any official or coach and they’ll probably say the same thing about him,” Brashear High School boys coach Carey White said. “What a unique official. What a unique person.”
Wagner officiated games from the WPIAL and City League to Division I colleges for more than three decades and had a unique style and personality that allowed him to do everything from making a player feel good to making a coach smile when he was about to blow a gasket.
Wagner was well known and much of the Pittsburgh area basketball officiating community is in mourning after Wagner’s recent death. His is a tragic story. On Christmas Eve, Wagner’s head was injured when he fell down the steps of his North Side home, according to his brother, Randy. Jeff Wagner died in a hospital two days later. He was 62.
Wagner cut his teeth years ago and earned his stripes as a WPIAL official, was eventually considered one of the tops in Western Pennsylvania, and worked his way up to working small college games and eventually Division I college games. But even though he worked mostly college games the past two decades, he still officiated some in the WPIAL and City League. He was so highly thought of that he was inducted into the Pittsburgh Basketball Club Hall of Fame in 2019.
But it’s not just working 30some years of basketball games that made Wagner one unique zebra. It’s how the guy known as “Wags’ went about officiating. White never knew Wagner before White was a coach.
“You ended up talking to him after games, just about life,” White said. “He would interact with coaches, players, fans, anyone in the gym. He always had a smile on his face and even players liked him. He always had an answer to give to calm someone down and that’s unique nowadays.”
Wagner was the type of person that if you knew him, and spent just five minutes with him, you were sure to laugh and probably feel a little better about yourself when you left him. He and his partner, Annette Tardy, had an adopted 6-year-old son, Jaysiah.
“When we were kids, my parents used to call him ‘Happy Traveler’ because that’s what he liked to do, go around and see people and make them happy,” Randy Wagner said. “He could talk to a bum in the street or a lawyer in Pittsburgh the same way. He made them feel good.”
Randy Miller is a longtime high school and small college basketball official who was a good friend of Wagner, who also worked for more than three decades as a flight attendant. Miller and Wagner worked countless games together at the college level and had many road trips together.
“We’d show up at games and people would be yelling, ‘Wags, how you doing?’ I used to tell him he was like a celebrity,” Miller said. “He loved the City League. He loved doing those games and there was really no one like him officiating.
“I worked games with him where a coach should’ve definitely been thrown out. I remember one where we had a Point Park game and you know how (coach) Bobby Rager got sometimes. I didn’t think he’d make it through the game. He was really starting to get upset. Next thing you know, foul shots are being taken and there’s Jeff, with his arms folded, standing next to
Rager, the way only Jeff could do. Rager looks like he’s begging. Next thing you know, Jeff says something, they both walk away giggling and things are OK. That was typical Jeff with people.”
RIP, Wags.
Fundraiser nets big profit
Two weeks ago, the PostGazette chronicled the WPIAL/City Basketball Virtual Food Drive fundraiser that benefits the Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank. The online fundraiser was the brainchild of North Catholic boys basketball coach Dave DeGregorio and the idea was that rather than have a food drive, anybody can make a donation to the food bank in the name of a WPIAL or City League team.
It’s amazing the money that has been raised.
When the fundraiser started, the Food Bank put a goal of $4,000 on it. Huh. The high school basketball community made about 17 times more than that.
As of Tuesday evening, the virtual food drive had raised almost $70,000. Donations are still being accepted through Jan. 16 and can be made by major credit cards, PayPal accounts or eCheck. Just go through the Pittsburgh Food Bank’s web site and the WPIAL/City page at www.pittsburghfoodbank.org/wpial.
The way it used to be
Uniontown now has decided to drop out of WPIAL football because it hasn’t been able to be competitive for so long. Butler did the same last year and for the same reasons. My, how some things have changed in the last half century of WPIAL football.
It used to be that Butler and Uniontown were perennial powers in the WPIAL, producing great teams and big-time players. To show you how much things have changed, consider the 1965 WPIAL title game in the largest classification. It was Butler vs. Uniontown at Pitt Stadium and the game had no fewer than 10 future major-college players and five future NFL players.
Butler, led by legendary coach Art Bernardi, had Rich and Ron Saul, who both had long careers in the NFL. Rich made six Pro Bowls.
Uniontown had future NFL players John Hull, Ray Parson and Nelson Munsey, as well as running back Ray Gillian (Ohio State) and quarterback Wilfred Minor (Nebraska). Uniontown won, 14-7.