When you think of superstars in college basketball, you think of multiple teams lined up in recruiting for a ready-made player.
For Mikal Bridges, this was not the case.
While there were many teams after the 6-foot-6 product out of Malvern, PA, Villanova was almost not one of them. Jay Wright joined Mike Francesa for an interview last week and he discussed how he was not impressed with Bridges early on.
“He was 6’6″, 6’7″ and was well-known because of his length and his potential,” Wright said. “We were not really recruiting him because he just was really thin and we just thought physically it was going to take him some time.”
During his senior year at Great Valley High School, Bridges had many offers from the likes of Penn State, Florida, Virginia Tech, and more. He was ranked as the No. 4 player in Pennsylvania, but his lanky stature made Villanova think hard about their offer.
After watching Bridges play multiple times and seeing that he had a great feel for the game, the Wildcats went in.
“He wasn’t really overly impressive except for the fact he had a great high school coach who taught him how to play without the basketball,” Weight said. “He was the star, but he moved without the ball, used screens, he cut… And we thought he really knows how to play.”
Villanova was loaded in Bridges’ first year and he decided to redshirt. This is when he worked hard to get stronger.
“He played in his first year with Arcidiacono, Hart, Kris Jenkins, Jalen Brunson,” Wright said. “We didn’t need to go to him. With his length, he got stronger. He worked with our strength coach. He worked extremely hard. His redshirt year was hell. He would practice with us. He would lift five times a week. Everybody else would lift three times a week. We used to take walk ons and just make him play one-on-one day of the game and let the walk-on just foul the hell out of him.”
Bridges eventually built himself into one of the top defenders in the nation. It showed in his first year when he made a play on National Player of the Year Frank Mason, coming away with the game-sealing steal that sent Villanova to the Final Four in 2016.
“By his freshman year, which is the first year he played, he had gotten stronger and tougher,” Wright said. “He was one of the best defensive players in the country. We won the national championship a lot because of him defensively, but we didn’t need him offensively.”
Fast forward through his career, Bridges won two Natioanl Championships in three years with the Wildcats. He averaged 17.7 points, 5.3 rebounds and 1.1 blocks while shooting 43.5 percent from three in his final season before becoming a Top 10 pick in the NBA. Bridges has turned into an ironman in the NBA as he has not missed a game during his career.
Bridges most recently helped lead the New York Knicks to an NBA Championship, becoming an all-time legend in NYC.
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