Villanova University basketball coach Jay Wright’s Newtown Square tailor, Gabriele “Gabe” D’Annunzio, featured in a recent MONTCO Today story, has died from COVID-19, reports Mike Jensen for The Philadelphia Inquirer.

Wright had the nickname GQ Jay as one of the best-dressed basketball coaches.

“It was all him,” Wright said Jan. 27. “It wasn’t me.”

D’Annunzio died Sunday, Jan. 24, at age 76. Born in Abruzzo, Italy, he grew up in West Philadelphia and later opened D&B Tailors in Newtown Square.

He made tuxedos for Frank Sinatra and suits for George Burns, as well as pro athletes and, of course, Coach Wright.

“A good man, a really good man,” Wright said. “This thing is brutal.” D’Annunzio has been with Wright about as long as Wright has been coaching at Villanova.

He met D’Annunzio through his former assistant, Pat Chambers, who really wanted Gabe to make a suit for the coach.

Wright kept saying no, then he gave in.

“Once he makes you a suit and it’s custom fit, then you’re addicted,” he said. “I’d pick something simple. He’d say, ‘Oh, no … we need something that’s going to pop.’”

Read more about Gabe D’Annunzio in The Philadelphia Inquirer.