Jay Bilas

Jay Bilas

Jay Bilas joined ESPN in 1995, and provides expert color commentary courtside on college basketball games and as a studio analyst for College Gamenight and ESPN’s College GameDay. Bilas also writes for ESPN.com, and contributes numerous reports to ESPN’s SportsCenter and ESPNEWS. Since 2003, Bilas has provided in-depth player scouting and analysis for ESPN’s coverage of the NBA Draft.

In 2007 and 2008, Bilas was nominated for an Emmy as Outstanding Studio Personality, and in 2008 Bilas was honored by the U.S. Basketball Writers Association (USBWA) for the Best Column of the Year. Sports Illustrated has twice named Bilas the best analyst in college basketball.

A prep All-American from Los Angeles, Calif., the 6-7 Bilas was a four-year starter at Duke under Mike Krzyzewski from 1982-86.  As an undersized center, Bilas scored 1,062 points, grabbed 692 rebounds, and helped lead Duke to the 1986 ACC Championship and NCAA Championship game.  Bilas’ 1986 Duke team still holds the NCAA record for the most wins in a single season with 37.

While a player at Duke, Bilas was one of only two student-athletes in the nation appointed to the NCAA’s Long-Range Planning Committee, and served from 1984-86.  He appeared on CBS’s Face the Nation in 1985 to discuss academics and athletics and was a panelist, along with Howard Cosell, John Underwood and Dr. Harry Edwards, on the prestigious 1986 National Sports Forum.

Drafted by the NBA’s Dallas Mavericks, Bilas played professional basketball overseas, ranking among the leagues’ top scorers in Italy during the 1987 and 1988 seasons, and then in Spain for part of the 1989 season. Bilas returned to Duke in 1990 to serve as an assistant coach on Krzyzewski’s staff, while also earning his law degree from Duke Law School.  As an assistant coach under Krzyzewski, the Blue Devils advanced to the NCAA Championship game three times, winning back-to-back National Championships in 1991 and 1992.

  A member of the Screen Actors Guild since 1988, Bilas has appeared in nationally run television commercials and had a feature role as an alien cop in the Columbia Pictures film Come In Peace.  While still in high school, Bilas appeared in an episode of the popular television series The White Shadow.

Bilas has also distinguished himself on Twitter, having been named to Sports Illustrated’s “Twitter 100” for being among the 100 most essential Twitter follows in sports, and by Dime Magazine as the #2 “Baller” on Twitter behind only Shaquille O’Neal. 

Since 1992, Bilas has been an attorney with the law firm of Moore & Van Allen, PLLC, where he has specialized in commercial litigation. Bilas serves on the Board of Advisors of the John R. Wooden Award, the Board of Advisors of the Chip Hilton Award, the National Board of the Coaches vs. Cancer Organization and the Board of Advisors of the Duke Brain Tumor Center and Duke Childrens’ Hospital. 

Bilas has participated as a coach in two “Operation Hardwood – Hoops With the Troops” basketball tournaments in 2005 and 2006, in which NCAA coaches and sports personalities coach military basketball teams at Camp Arifjan, Kuwait. 

Bilas is a native of San Pedro, Calif., and now resides in Charlotte, N.C.

- 30 -