Minium: Norfolk Sports Club to Honor ODU's Jena Virga For Her Fundraising Prowess

By Harry Minium

NORFOLK – The Norfolk Sports Club will honor a transformative figure in Old Dominion’s athletic history when it hosts its annual Jamboree Thursday night at Chartway Arena.

In just 13 years with the Old Dominion Athletic Foundation, this person helped ODU raise more than $150 million. That money helped make possible the $76.5 million renovation of S.B. Ballard Stadium, the $8.6 million Mitchum Basketball Performance Center and the soon-to-be $20 million makeover of ODU’s Bud Metheny Baseball Stadium.

Because college athletic fundraising remains largely a male-dominated field, you could be forgiven if you assumed this honor was being accorded to a man.

But you would be wrong.

Jena Virga, ODU class of 1979, a former bank executive with an MBA and work ethic that never quits, will be named as Norfolk’s Tom Fergusson Metropolitan Person of the Year in Sports. She will be only the fifth woman to be accorded that honor since the sports club began the award in 1943.

The award is named for the late Tom Fergusson, a Virginian-Pilot sports reporter who helped found the sports club during World War II.

Previous winners of that award include mayors, coaches, players, sports owners and athletics administrators. Dr. Wood Selig, ODU’s director of athletics, won the award in both 2013 and 2023.

But none of the previous 82 winners was a fundraiser.

“Jena is a female in a male-dominated profession and these awards tend to skew male,” Dr. Selig said. “For her to win this award speaks to the incredible impact she has had on sports in Hampton Roads.

“We’re so incredibly proud of her and the Norfolk Sports Club for recognizing her.”

A Norfolk native and a graduate of Lake Taylor High School, Virga is a force of nature whose personality dominates the room. Her enthusiasm never seems to waver.

Whenever Ice Cream and Cake, a quirky song that ODU has turned into a beloved university tradition, is played at Chartway Arena, Virga invariably is seen dancing to the music.

She is a charming person with a magnetic personality, all of which has helped her as a fundraiser, but didn’t necessarily help her make it in the banking business.

“I always had to work a little harder to prove myself,” she said. “But I learned that I liked the type of camaraderie that guys have with each other. I fit in. I could talk guy’s talk.”

Jack Ankerson, who serves on the committee that selected this year’s award winners, said when he brought up her name, everyone immediately agreed “that it was a hell of a smart idea.”

“Everything big that has happened at ODU athletics in recent years, Jena has been a part of it,” Ankerson said. “What she’s done for ODU has just been remarkable.”

Under her guidance, ODAF has raised far more money than any other Sun Belt Conference school and only a handful of schools this side of the Power 4 have raised as much as ODU.

In fiscal year 2022 alone, ODU raised $18 million, a staggering figure for a Group of 5 school.

Elza Mitchum, a prominent area businessman who serves as president of three Hampton Roads companies, has been one of ODU’s most generous donors. His son, Alex, is also a donor who formed The Pride of ODU, a collective that helps compensate ODU student-athletes for their Name, Image and Likeness.

The Mitchum family was persuaded by Mark Benson, who then headed ODAF, and Virga to make the naming donation for the Bernett and Blanche Mitchem Basketball Performance Center, named for Elza Mitchum’s parents.

“I don’t think my family would have donated half the amount we’ve given to Old Dominion without Jena Virga,” Mitchum said.

“No one represents Old Dominion better than Jena Virga with her smile, her enthusiasm and her unparalleled fundraising ability.”

“She’s good at it. She’s fleeced me plenty of times,” he added with a laugh.

“Fundraising is about building relationships and telling the story of what someone’s generosity can accomplish,” added Keith Curtis, an ODU graduate who has headed the Curtis Group, which fundraises for area and national non-profits, since 1989. He is also an ODU donor.

“Jena is a great advocate not just for athletics, but also for the university. People like her because she’s genuine.

“So much of what she does is make your support of ODU athletics fun. Whether it’s a trip you’re taking with ODAF, or you’re just attending a home game, she makes things so much fun.”

Virga broke into banking shortly after graduation in1979 while working on her MBA. “I had to earn the trust of my bosses and my customers,” she said. “You have to be able to communicate with people and I always had that ability.

She left banking to raise money for the Children’s Hospital of the King’s Daughters. She then took six years off to be home with her children, and when she wanted to return to the workforce, she called ODU’s Alonzo Brandon, who hired her to raise major gifts for the business school.

Brandon, vice president of university advancement and executive director of foundations at ODU, has been her boss ever since. Then, in 2010, Benson, now athletic director at UAlbany, hired her away to work in athletics.

“It was two weeks before the football season and I was in charge of major gifts and premium seating,” she said. “And I didn’t know one thing about college athletics.

“But I loved my job then and have loved every minute of it since.”

In 2022, she was named executive director of ODAF by ODU President Brian O. Hemphill, Ph.D.

“That’s a position that’s usually reserved for university vice presidents,” Dr. Selig said. “That said so much about how the university feels about Jena.”

Virga won’t be the only person affiliated with ODU to be honored.

Jeff Jones, who retired as ODU’s men’s basketball coach in February, will receive a Lifetime Achievement Award. Jones, 64, was a coach for 41 years, including 32 as a head coach. He won 560 games at ODU, Virginia and American.

He continued to coach after being treated for prostate cancer nine years ago but after a December heart attack, he finally decided to step aside.

“He’s had a wonderful coaching career, not just at ODU, but also at Virginia and American,” Ankerson said. “Awards don’t get much bigger than a lifetime achievement award. When he announced he was stepping down, he was our automatic choice.”

J.P. Leigh, a former All-American golfer at ODU, will receive the club's presidential award. Leigh was an All-American golfer at ODU who helped the late Pete Robinson and later Murray Rudisill raise money and coach the ODU teams.

“J.P. has been around ODU for so long,” Selig said. “I’ve known him since I was a kid. He used to referee my JV and varsity basketball games.”

Rudisill will present Leigh his award, while Dr. Selig will present both Jones and Virga with their awards.

Virga will thank Brandon, Benson and Selig and her parents, the late Viva and Robert Woodley as well as her husband, Andy, and sons, Andrew and Sean.

And she will remark briefly on her childhood in Norfolk’s Glengariff neighborhood, where she grew to love ODU as a child.

Her father graduated from the Norfolk Division of the College of William and Mary, which later became ODU. Her brother in law, Barry Stokes, played for ODU basketball.

She was accepted by Virginia Tech out of high school, “but I wanted to go to my hometown school.

“I’m a Norfolk girl. I’ve always loved this city and loved ODU.

“I look forward to work every day at ODU. Our team at ODAF, they work so hard. They’re so wonderful to work with. So is Wood Selig. He would go any place at any time when we ask him to to help us raise money.

“I’m really blessed. And I can’t thank the Norfolk Sports Club enough for this honor.”

The Jamboree begins at 6:30 p.m. Thursday in the Big Blue Club. Former UVA and NFL football player Tiki Barber is the featured speaker.

For ticket information, call 757-683-4444.

Minium is in his sixth year as ODU's senior executive writer for athletics. Contact him at hminium@odu.edu or follow him  on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram