VILLANOVA, PA - While the Villanova University community revels in anticipation of Saturday's Final Four battle with Kansas in San Antonio, Texas, the Wildcats’ true home is the John “Jake” Nevin Field House.
On November 29, 2017, the Wildcats played at the arena for the first time since 1986. For the majority of current Villanova students, the Jake Nevin Field House is where the volleyball team plays, or where intramural basketball games take place. To longtime Villanovans, the Field House is a secondary thought as compared to the person for whom the Field House is named.
Somewhere halfway between the drive down Lancaster Avenue from Wayne to Bryn Mawr, you will pass Jake Nevin Field House at the corner of Lancaster and Ithan Avenues. The large brick building almost appears like it is two different structures. The front structure includes three sets of black double doors for entry, with several windows running horizontally above them; the back structure is double the height of the front and includes three arched windows with a stone, circular crest of “Villanova University” etched proudly at the very top.
Villanova's John "Jake" Nevin Field House - PSD Photo by John Knebels
On a rainy evening in the mid 1930’s, Jake Nevin was making that exact trip, from Wayne to Bryn Mawr. According to legend, Jake stopped in for some cover from the heavy rain, and at the same time, a Villanova student suffered a basketball-related injury. As Jake attended to the student, the Augustinians became aware and ultimately decided to make Jake the first full-time athletic trainer at Villanova University.
Fifty years of pranks, friendship, and memories all started by chance, right there in the Field House that would eventually bear his name several decades later.
Gary Becker spent an inordinate amount of time with Jake Nevin as both a student manager and timekeeper for the Villanova Men’s Basketball team from 1972 until Jake’s passing in December of 1986.
“For someone who never met him, describing Jake Nevin is an impossible task because, he is unlike any person you have ever met,” said Becker.
Here is a story of the character that is Jake Nevin, through the individual accounts and descriptions of those who knew him best.
A balding, gnomish figure, Jake Nevin always had a cigar in his mouth. Sometimes the cigar was lit, most of the time it was not because, “It lasts longer that way.”
He was not 5 feet tall, he was “4 foot 12.” He embodied a leprechaun, both by his physical appearance and also the magic that came with his spirit. His innate ability to understand human nature made him quick witted, with a real sense of humor. Whether it be putting bricks in coach Al Severance’s brief case or having women frantically move their hands to their ears after tricking them into thinking that they had lost an earing, Jake had a joke for everyone.
Despite being a professional chop-buster, Jake Nevin was also your best friend.
Jake Nevin - Photo courtesy of Marty Marbach
Whether you were an All-American or a team manager, Jake treated you the same. He was born in February of 1910 at 19 Thomas Avenue in Bryn Mawr, PA, where he lived his entire life. Jake was the legend of Bryn Mawr.
If you were writing him a postcard from anywhere in the country, one simply had to write, “Jake, USA, 19010”, and the postcard would find its way to 19 Thomas Avenue.
Becker would often drive Jake from practice to his home, which often included a stop for food at the Mari-nay Diner, formerly located at the site of the current day McDonald’s on Lancaster Ave.
As a team manager, Becker was able to spend time with Jake differently than others.
“Jake cared so much to help people,” Becker said. “He is the finest man I have ever met in that his sincere caring for people is as significant as I’ve ever seen.”
Becker promised Jake that he would name his first-born son in his honor, but after Gary’s first two children were girls, Jake grew skeptical.
“He got tired of waiting for me to have a son so he started calling my youngest daughter ‘Little Jake,’” said Becker.
Jake Nevin loved every athlete that ever came through Villanova. Despite never having attended the school, Jake was a true Villanovan. His small bedroom was filled with Villanova sports memorabilia.
Two athletes fortunate enough to have visited this room were Ed Hastings and Whitey Rigsby. Hastings played for Villanova from 1970 to 1973 and later returned as an assistant coach. He was a member of the 1971 Final Four team and developed a strong relationship with Jake throughout his time at Villanova. Hastings recalls his first collegiate game.
“My first game at the Palestra,” said Hastings. “Jake was taping my ankles and he told me, ‘Son, you need to calm down. I can’t tape your ankles because you’re shaking so much.’”
The playful wisdom forced a smile from Hastings.
“He helped athletes far more with his humor than he did with his ability to tape ankles or attend to pain,” he said.
Rigsby played basketball at Villanova from 1974-1978, where he fostered an extremely deep relationship with Jake Nevin. Their relationship is symbolic of the lasting impact that Nevin had on all whom he encountered.
“When you think of Jake Nevin, you think of the building,” said Rigsby. “When I think of Jake Nevin, I think of the guy who introduced me to my wife.”
When she was a nine-year-old, Jake would help the future Mrs. Rigsby access the Field House so she could watch basketball games. When she later became a student at Villanova nearly 10 years later, Jake introduced Whitey to Becky in the cafeteria that is now called Café Nova.
Several years and seven kids later, the Rigsby’s have been together ever since.
A picture of Jake Nevin, cigar in mouth, hangs in Rigsby’s office, directly over his right shoulder. Rigsby recalled one night when he was a player. A group of unnamed teammates had some trouble at a bar the night before a game against St. Bonaventure in upstate New York. Refusing to attach himself to the group of troublemakers, Rigsby explained that the police asked the group to bring him to their coach.
Jake Nevin was the Wildcat's athletic trainer for 50 years - Photo by Marty Marbach
There was an unspoken understanding among the players that by no means could they bring the police officer to see Coach Rollie Massimino. Without hesitation, the players led the officer directly to Jake Nevin’s room, where Jake assured the officer that he would “take care of it.” When the officer left, Jake told each of the players to go back to their rooms.
“Coach Mass never knew,” said Rigsby.
As a trainer for 50 years, Jake lived through several eras of Villanova Basketball. Jake’s final era as a member of the program overlapped with Coach Massimino’s first 11 years as head coach of the Wildcats.
Symbolic of Coach Massimino’s time at Villanova is the 1985 National Championship. Symbolic of the team’s run to the 1985 National Championship was Jake Nevin. Jake and Coach Massimino worked in perfect contrast with one another. If you were watching from the stands, Rollie was stationed on the right side of the bench, passionately pacing the sideline, barking out orders in a full suit. Conversely, Jake sat on the medical box to the left of the bench, subtle and subdued, with an unlit cigar in his mouth as he calmly watched the game.
“Coach Massimino loved Jake because he could always make him laugh,” said Marty Marbach, an assistant on Massimino’s staff. “But Jake always knew when to back off.”
Chuck Everson, a Villanova basketball player from 1982 until 1986, had his ankles taped by Jake every single day.
“Getting taped by Jake was like being taped with tissue paper,” said Everson. “You did not go to get taped, you went to talk to Jake.”
Everson recalls one day in the training room where manager Billy Higgins came in talking about a girl in class that left him roses. Jake egged on Billy, asking him question after question about the girl and the roses. When Billy left the room, Jake looked at Chuck and laughed – it was not the girl that left roses for Billy, it was Jake. The training room, with several players present, erupted in laughter.
If you were to ask him, “Jake, how long have you been at Villanova?” he would pause, stare down at his watch and reply, “7:30.”
Whether he was engaged in a staring contest in the training room with players, cutting an assistant coach’s tie before a game, writing “R” and “L” on white tube socks in the players lockers, or dipping his cigar ashes in the players’ basketball sneakers, Jake Nevin would make you laugh, and you could not ever get angry with him.
Before the 1985 season, Jake became very sick. One of his primary caretakers at the time was Fran Raggazino, a trainer under Jake for the few years before he died. Raggazino was present at 19 Thomas Avenue when Jake was diagnosed with ALS.
“A young doctor comes in and gives Jake his death sentence, explaining that he was diagnosing him with Lou Gehrig’s disease,” said Raggazino. “He asked Jake if he had any questions. Jake paused for a minute and said, ‘Doc, how could I have Lou Gehrig’s disease? I never played a second of baseball in my life.’ The look on the doctor’s face said it all.”
That famous line embodies Jake Nevin’s humor. Even as he faced death, he was able to undercut the situation in such a way that could make an entire room burst into laughter.
Lou Gehrig’s disease crippled Jake’s body, but his mind remained sharp. The players on the 1985 National Championship Team dedicated that season to Jake Nevin. The team played its Round of 32 Tournament game against the number-one seed Michigan Wolverines in Dayton, Ohio, on Saint Patrick’s Day, 1985.
Before the game, Jake told some members of the team that when he knew they were going to win, he would put on a plastic leprechaun hat.
With about two minutes left in the game, Villanova held a lead, but the game was still in doubt. At that time, Jake Nevin could be seen at the end of the bench wearing the plastic hat that he promised.
As Coach Massimino yelled down the bench, “Jake, what are you doing?” he replied, “We’re gonna win!”
Throughout the tournament, players looked to Jake’s overwhelming positivity for good luck. Upon re-entering the National Championship Game against Georgetown in the final minute, Harold Jensen kissed Jake Nevin on the forehead before famously sinking his four free throw attempts to clinch Villanova’s National Championship victory. Symbolic of the victory is a picture of Jake Nevin in his wheel chair, wearing the cut down net around his neck.
“We don’t win that game if he isn’t with us,” said Everson emphatically. “I firmly believe that. He was a magical person.”
Photo by Marty Marbach
Villanova won the National Championship on April 1, 1985, a day when practical jokers like Jake earn their title. Eight months later, on December 9, 1986, Jake Nevin died in his bedroom at 19 Thomas Avenue in Bryn Mawr at the age of 75.
The rain poured on the day of his funeral, which took place in the same Field House that he stepped into 50 years earlier on a similarly rainy day. Villanovans filed in to offer their respect and honor. The service was carried on local television in Philadelphia. His casket was positioned underneath the basket closest to the stage – the same basket that the 2017 Villanova Men’s Basketball team dominated during their 90-62 victory over the University of Pennsylvania in the arena’s debut November 29.
As athletes, managers, and coaches came and went, Jake Nevin remained constant at Villanova University; as old buildings are renovated and new buildings are erected, the Jake Nevin Field House has remained constant at Villanova University – the only college campus in America with an athletic building dedicated to a “trainer.”
The Villanova Wildcats will take the floor tomorrow evening at 8:49p.m. in the 2018 NCAA Final Four with grand hopes of moving on to the NCAA National Championship – no doubt, Jake will be watching.