Jim Tressel wasn’t expecting to say anything. On the night he was formally introduced as Ohio State’s new head coach, greeting the crowd at the Ohio State-Michigan basketball game in Columbus on Jan. 18, 2001, he thought he’d smile, wave and “we’d live happily ever after,” as Tressel says now. But that evening, following introductory remarks by former athletic director Andy Geiger, Tressel was abruptly handed a microphone.
On the spot, he came up with his first address to Buckeye Nation: “I can assure you that you will be proud of your young people in the classroom, in the community, and most especially in 310 days in Ann Arbor, Michigan.