There are three people that former Villanova forward Will Sheridan sees as father figures in his life: his actual father, Jay Wright, and Delaware State coach Stan Waterman.
Waterman is in his second year coaching the Hornets after spending 30 seasons at Sanford. In his tenure, the Warriors won eight state titles, including in 2002 with Sheridan and in 2019 and 2021 with Njoku. Waterman also coached Villanova forward Eric Dixon. Waterman was a USA Basketball assistant for youth teams in 2016 and 2017, when Dixon attended the national team’s training camp.
He sees Villanova as the standard of basketball cultures, and wants to develop Delaware State in the way Villanova developed under Wright. However, Waterman has experience building a program. Njoku says that one of the reasons he chose Villanova was because its culture was similar to the one he was in under Waterman at Sanford.