Opportunity knocks
William Jeffress is acting as if he’s ready to step into the void at Pitt.
It takes a special set of circumstances to surprise Jeff Capel, so much so that it’s often futile to ask the Pitt coach if he’s ever taken aback by something that transpired in a game or around his program. The answer is always going to be the same.
In William Jeffress’ case, though, it only took four words — how are you doing?
Earlier this season, Jeffress came into his coach’s office. Capel was expecting his freshman to complain. After all, things hadn’t always gone easily or smoothly in Jeffress’ first college season, and at one point, the Erie native’s minutes had dropped to the point of being nonexistent.
Instead, as Jeffress sat down, he asked Capel how he was doing and how he was holding up.
“I was shocked,” Capel said. “I don’t know the last time I’ve been asked that. By anybody. Hell, my wife doesn’t ask me that.”
Capel has known for some time that Jeffress isn’t your average college freshman, but as the season has progressed, there have been new and different ways in which that fact has been reinforced. Over the Panthers’ past two games, the firstyear player has shown it to a larger audience.
In a 70-57 victory Tuesday against Wake Forest, Jeffress looked as capable, confident and calm as he has all season, scoring eight points in 37 minutes, both of which were season highs. Defensively, he was strong, finishing with two blocks and using his length to limit whatever it was his man tried to create on the perimeter. That showing came after a commendable performance against N.C. State two days earlier, a game in which he was praised for his defensive effort against Wolfpack standout Jericole Hellems.
Jeffress’ freshman season hasn’t always gone as planned. Over a six-game stretch in January and February, the former top-100 recruit appeared in one contest, logging 14 of a possible 240 minutes. Through it all, though, he maintained a sense of poise and perspective that surprised even the most hardened observers.
“Life’s all about your journey and what you do to get there,” Jeffress said. “It’s not always about the destination. You’re going to face a lot of adversity, a lot of trials and tribulations and stuff that’s going to get in your way. Sometimes there’s only one way to get through it and that’s to push through, to be able to at the end of this season almost find myself and figure out how to work, figure out what I like to do and things I can do on the court to stay on the floor.”
It isn’t just Jeffress’ mental makeup and approach to the game that make him unusual for a freshman.
When he was younger, Jeffress skipped a grade and had enough academic credits to graduate from McDowell High School a year early, allowing him to jump from the 2021 recruiting class to the 2020 one. At 17 years old, he became the youngest ACC player to compete in a game since North Carolina’s Brad Daugherty in 1982, a fact that is bound to be mentioned on any game broadcast whenever the camera pans to Jeffress.
Jeffress was brought along quickly and carefully, something that allowed him to be in the position he is today at the age he is. He said his father, Bill, had a large hand in his development, setting up workouts and pushing him in his various basketball endeavors. As Jeffress noted, a lot of things in his life came easier to him than college basketball did.
“When you get to college, you become a little more independent,” Jeffress said. “You have to find that drive and that push for yourself. I knew I had it inside of me. I just didn’t know how to act on it.”
Helpful as that was when he was younger, it presented some problems once he arrived at Pitt. By his own admission, he didn’t know how to create drills for himself or take other measures that could mold him into the player he wanted to be and knew he could become. So, in that moment, he decided it was time to sit down with his coach.
“I love talking to him because you can have deep conversations with him,” Capel said. “And he said to me, and he was very honest like, ‘Coach, I don’t know how to work.’ It’s very rare to hear a kid take ownership like that. Most kids want to blame or point the finger. He’s learning how to work, learning that extra work is not punishment, learning that staying after practice or coming in early or doing things at different times, that’s not punishment. That’s how you get better. And he wants to be good.”
Over the past week — and after the transfer of Au’Diese Toney, who played a similar position and filled a similar niche on the team — Jeffress has started to show the promise that accompanied his arrival to Pitt.
In the past two games, he has played 56 minutes, nearly double the 32 minutes he played in the Panthers’ previous nine games. He has excelled defensively, showing an ability to stay with guards and even hang with taller, stronger opponents on the low post. Given what he’s already able to do on that end of the court at his age, it’s difficult to watch him in those sequences without thinking of what he might evolve into with more experience.
Offensively, he’s not nearly as developed. He’s shooting just 23.6% from the field and 15.8% from 3-point range this season. Even in the past two games, when his minute and point totals have shot up, he has gone 4 of 14 overall and 1 of 4 from 3. In bursts, though, and as he spends more time on the court, he settles into what appears to be a rhythm, allowing him to do things like step into a shot in transition and make it as his team was trying to mount a comeback.
“William, he’s going to be a real huge piece here,” guard Nike Sibande said.
With an increased role has come increased confidence, something he visibly lacked in the times when he was only appearing in games for a few stray minutes. In Sunday’s loss against N.C. State, there was a telling stretch about midway through the first half. Coming off a screen, Jeffress drove at Manny Bates, the ACC’s leading shot-blocker. As he went up for a layup, Bates, with a 4-inch height advantage, sent the attempt back. Jeffress recollected the ball and briefly appeared to have an opening to try again, but Bates again swatted it away.
Those three seconds were instructive. Not only did Jeffress have the confidence to go at one of the league’s best defensive players in the first place, but he was willing to do so again after getting blocked immediately beforehand, displaying the kind of convenient amnesia Capel wants his players to embody.
As his first college season nears its end, the prodigious freshman is starting to find his way.
“Everything in my life has always been pushed forward,” Jeffress said. “Honestly, this is where I feel like I’m supposed to be. I think it’s funny when people say that I’m 17, because I don’t feel like it. I certainly don’t think I act like it. I really don’t think my age has had an impact on me acclimating to the college game or acclimating to being a freshman in college, being away from home or anything like that. No matter how young people think I am, I’m where I’m supposed to be.”