This winter, ex-Cat Dwight Perry has been thrust into a Division I head coaching job

If the goal of college is to get one ready for career challenges, Dwight Perry’s most memorable moment as a Kentucky Wildcats men’s basketball player may have uniquely prepared him for the unanticipated task he has faced this winter.

On Dec. 5, Perry found out he was being elevated from his assistant’s role to Wofford College men’s basketball interim head coach.

That unexpected assignment for the ex-UK walk-on came after Terriers head man Jay McAuley took an abrupt leave of absence. Shortly after Christmas, McAuley stepped down permanently amid media reports that multiple players had allegedly gone to the Wofford administration to say they were unwilling to continue to play for McAuley.

That is when Perry found out he would serve as interim Wofford head coach for the remainder of the 2022-23 season.

“It’s been a really unique and challenging time,” Perry said last week in a phone interview.

Being thrust into an unexpected spotlight is not a first-time experience for Perry. The Durham, N.C., product was once at the center of one of the more bizarre moments in UK men’s hoops history.

Shortly before Kentucky was to tip off its 2007 NCAA Tournament quest against Villanova at the United Center in Chicago, Perry received shocking news. The 6-foot, 185-pound freshman walk-on — who had appeared in only three games during the 2006-07 season — was informed he would be starting.

As it turned out, UK had fouled up its starting lineup in the official scorer’s book. Instead of normal starter Bobby Perry, Kentucky had listed his little-used first cousin, Dwight, among its starters. So Kentucky had to either start Dwight Perry or take a technical foul for failing to submit the correct starting lineup.

Shortly before tip off, Dwight Perry says then-UK assistant Scott Rigot matter-of-factly informed him he would be starting.

That’s how Perry found himself seated on the UK bench with Randolph Morris, Joe Crawford, Ramel Bradley and Derrick Jasper waiting for the Kentucky starters to be introduced. At guard, a 6-foot freshman from Durham, N.C., No. 30, Dwight Perry ...

“I remember thinking, ‘I can’t believe this is happening,’” Dwight Perry says.

Three seconds after the ball was tipped off, Perry followed the instructions from the UK coaching staff and fouled Villanova’s Curtis Sumpter. That stopped the clock so that Bobby Perry, who had begun the game waiting to check in at the scorer’s table, could promptly replace his cousin.

Tubby Smith’s Wildcats went on to beat Jay Wright’s Wildcats 67-58. The scorebook misadventures that led to Kentucky having to start a little-used reserve in an NCAA Tournament game became a happy footnote as opposed to the massive controversy it might have been had the outcome been reversed.

“One of my former teammates, (ex-UK star) Jodie Meeks, always jokes about it, that I started more NCAA Tournament games our freshman year than he did,” Dwight Perry says. “That really would have been bad (had UK lost).”

Dealing with such unexpected chaos has been Dwight Perry’s assigned task this basketball season, too. On Dec. 5, Perry was summoned by Wofford Athletics Director Richard Johnson and told that his boss, McAuley, was taking personal leave — and that Perry was now the Terriers’ interim head man.

From the time Levi Beckwith, Perry’s coach at Durham’s Southern High School, had suggested he consider coaching as a career, Perry had been dreaming of the day he would become a college head coach. With Bobby Perry’s help, Dwight had chosen to attend UK as a hoops walk-on specifically to prepare for a career in coaching.

After graduating from Kentucky, Dwight Perry had served as an intern under Johnny Dawkins at Stanford; as a graduate assistant and, then, video coordinator for Shaka Smart at VCU; and as an assistant at both Furman and Wofford. All of those steps were taken with the goal of becoming a head man.

But an in-season elevation to interim head coach was “definitely not a way anyone would imagine or want (to get a head-coaching chance),” Perry says. “It is bittersweet, a bittersweet feeling.”

On his first day running the Wofford program, Perry, in consultation with assistants Tysor Anderson and Will Murphy, decided to cancel practice so the Terriers players could emotionally process the coaching change. This even though Wofford was scheduled to play Coastal Carolina the following night.

“We let them gather their thoughts, get their emotions back in order,” Perry says. “We had a shoot-around Tuesday morning, played Coastal Carolina Tuesday night — and we beat them (71-61).”

Perry found out just before the calendar turned from 2022 to 2023 that he would be the Wofford head man for the remainder of this season. The Terriers (14-14, 6-9 Southern Conference) have gone 9-10 with Perry calling the shots.

The shining moment to date for Perry and his team came Dec. 20 when Wofford beat Texas A&M (19-7, 11-2 SEC) — currently one game behind No. 1 Alabama for the top spot in the SEC standings — on the Aggies’ home court. That 67-62 Wofford win is A&M’s only home loss this season.

“It was awesome,” Perry says. “To see our guys win that game and reap the benefits of the work they’ve put in, as a coach, you feel an immense amount of joy and satisfaction.”

With only three regular-season games plus the Southern Conference Tournament remaining on the Wofford schedule, the ultimate duration of Perry’s stint running the Terriers program is still to be determined.

“In a perfect world, I’d love to be the head coach here at Wofford,” Dwight Perry says. “If that’s not in the cards, we’ve got to continue to do what’s best and move on.”

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