Quotes from Head Coach Fred Hoiberg and Athletic Director Bill Moos

Bill Moos opening statement
“Hello, everybody. This is a special and exciting day for the University of Nebraska and especially for me because I have the honor and privilege to introduce the 28^th head coach of Husker basketball, Fred Hoiberg.”

Fred Hoiberg opening statement
“First of all, I want to thank Bill. I want to thank Chancellor Green and President Bounds for this wonderful opportunity. It’s a very emotional day for me, for my family, a lot of whom are sitting over here this afternoon and with great ties to this state, with great ties to this university. It starts with my grandparents. I know a lot has written about my Grandpa (Jerry) Bush, who coached here back in the 50s and 60s. But my other grandfather, Otto Hoiberg, was a history professor here for almost 30 years. To be honest with you, he’s the smartest person that I have ever known, and he moved back to Iowa in his later years and I was able to spend a lot of time with him. Those were very special moments to be able to talk to my grandpa because of how worldly and how smart he was. My parents, who are here today, Eric and Karen, both went to Nebraska. They are alums (1966). Dad went on to get his Master’s in ’69 and his Ph.D. in 72, which is the year I was born here at Lincoln General. I don’t remember a lot about Lincoln as a kid. I moved to Ames when I was two, when my dad got a job offer at Iowa State. He also got a job offer at Kansas, so I’ll always say I’m forever grateful to my dad for making the right decision. Also I want to introduce a few other people: my brother, Steve, is here. Steve lives in Omaha now and actually taught at the University of Nebraska-Omaha for many years until his current position with Siemens Corporation. His wife, Carrie, is here, a Nebraska native, and daughter Isabelle – my niece – is in seventh grade, and Emma, who was hired by Coach Miles this last year in the basketball department. My cousin, Joe, is here. He just moved to Lincoln last year. His mother, Bonnie, is also a Nebraska alum. And then my aunt and uncle are here. My uncle Dennis is a Clearwater, Nebraska legend. He’s a Nebraska high school hall of famer. And my aunt Jane, who also went to Nebraska…you’ll notice Jane at the games. She’ll have one of those basketball hat masks on. She’ll be wearing that and she’ll be the one with the ‘Go Big Fred’ sign. Thanks for coming.

I also want to introduce my wife, Carol, who is here today. Carol and I, I can’t believe we’ve been together now for 30 years. Though I won’t tell the story, Carol, that you asked me to prom when I was a sophomore back at Ames High School. She’s the rock of our family. When you’re a coach you need a great support system and I have that, and a lot of that has to do with my parents, my brothers and also my wife. Our four kids could not make it today. Our daughter, Paige, is a senior at Kansas. She graduates from Kansas, which just kind of freaks me out that it’s gone as fast as it has. She will graduate in May. Our son, Jack, who we just spent time with this past weekend in Washington D.C, is a player on the Michigan State team. They’re getting ready for the Final Four, which has been a great thrill for our family to see Jack and his team cut down the nets in D.C. just this last week. And then our twins, Sam and Charlie, who we were going to bring, but they missed class on Monday and they’re going to miss class again on Friday, so we felt we should probably keep them in school as much as we can. When you make a move like this you have to have total support from everybody. And we have that, and it’s very special.

The vision that Bill laid out to me when we started talking about this opportunity, I see real potential here to have long-term success. And a lot of that has to do with the facilities that are here. We played an exhibition game a couple years ago when I was coaching for the Bulls, and I was just absolutely amazed. It was actually a really good game against the Mavericks. Doug McDermott hit the game-winner on a sideline out-of-bounds play we call ‘Larry Bird’. That’s neither here nor there. But anyway it was a great moment to see those facilities. We played a closed-door scrimmage against Doc Sadler back in 2011 when the practice facility was just being built, and I’m telling you these facilities are as nice as any in the country. And that’s a very attractive thing when you’re trying to attract recruits to a market like this. And also the fan support is second to none. I was a diehard Husker football growing up as a kid, and it’s just amazing every seat in this stadium has been filled since 1962. And at basketball games you’ll see the atmosphere. I watched a lot of Big Ten basketball this year because of Jack and because of Michigan State. And it’s just such an unbelievable atmosphere. I think Tim Miles did a great job and deserves a lot of credit for bringing excitement to this program, and now it’s our job to build on that and hopefully become a consistent winner.

I talked earlier about my grandfather. It’s such a thrill for me to be able to walk, different buildings but on the same sidelines my grandfather did. It’s pretty amazing. He probably has the best win in the history of Nebraska basketball. They’d lost earlier in the season against a Kansas team led by Wilt Chamberlain (102-46). They asked him before the game, “When did you know you were going to lose?” And he said when we got out of the bus and Wilt reached across the roof and closed the door that way. But then to go back and win that game (two weeks later, 43-41)…it’s not very often you shut school down with a basketball win, but they actually did that the next day, they shut classes down. That following week, to go on and beat Kansas State (55-48), a team led by Bob Boozer who was the No. 1 team in the nation, so that was a really fun week for my grandfather and for my family. I didn’t get to know him very well. He passed away when I was three years old. But to hear the stories…Albert Maxey is here today. He played for my grandfather and has always been great to our family. But I always got letters from my grandfather’s former players, and just to know the impact that he had on their lives. To hear from my grandpa’s players is really cool. To know the type of person my grandfather was and the impact he had in the community here because of the type of personality that he was, is always a lot of fun for me to hear.

So I’m excited about this, guys. I met with the team just a couple minutes before we came down here. I talked to them about the opportunity that we have moving forward. This is such a special time of year. The greatest sporting event in the world is going on right now, the NCAA Tournament. I challenged them with the amount of work it takes. I was fortunate enough to play 10 years in the NBA, and I didn’t play because I was the most athletic. I didn’t play because I was the most gifted. The reason I played was because I was the hardest worker. Nobody was going to out-work me. That’s how I got to that level, and that’s what I’m going to demand and expect out of our players, is to go out every day and give everything we can and put an exciting product on the floor that will make our fans proud. And that’s what we’re going to strive to do. Starting the week after the Final Four, we’re going to get going with our workouts. We’re fortunate enough to have a foreign trip this year, so we’ll get a head start to the season over in Italy. There’s a lot of work to do. I hit the road tomorrow. We’re going to get in the plane and we’re going to go out and see some kids and get this thing moving right away. And we lose a lot. There’s a lot of really good players that are graduating from this institution, and we’ve got a lot to replace. Again, our players understand that and we know we have to do everything possible to put ourselves in a position where we’re going to be successful and be a consistent winner.”