Jerry Colangelo

Jerry Colangelo (born November 20, 1939 in Chicago Heights, Illinois), is an American businessman and sports mogul.

He is the former owner of the Phoenix Suns of the NBA, the Phoenix Mercury of the WNBA, the Arizona Sandsharks of the Continental Indoor Soccer League, the Arizona Rattlers of the Arena Football League and the Arizona Diamondbacks of Major League Baseball. He was also instrumental in the relocation of the Winnipeg Jets of the NHL to Phoenix to become the Phoenix Coyotes, which is now in bankruptcy.[1]

He is the national director of USA Basketball and of the team that represented the United States in the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Colangelo also serves as Chairman of the National Italian American Foundation (NIAF), a nonprofit nonpartisan educational foundation that promotes Italian American culture and heritage. NIAF also serves as the voice for Italian Americans in Washington, D.C.

Colangelo grew up in Chicago Heights, Illinois where he was a basketball and baseball star for Bloom Township High School. He graduated from the University of Illinois, where he captained the basketball team and was a member of Phi Kappa Psi Fraternity.