Tobin Anderson ’95 recently coached at Fairleigh Dickinson University (FDU) where, in his lone year on the team, led them to the NCAA tournament, where they pulled off the biggest upset in tournament history defeating the #1 seed Purdue Boilermakers. Anderson attended Wesleyan University as an undergraduate and played on the basketball team, scoring 1,129 points in his four years, making him the 11th all-time scorer in school history. The Wesleyan alum began his coaching career as an assistant coach at Clarkson University and, after a brief departure, took over as the head coach at Clarkson for six years. Anderson then accepted the head coach position at Hamilton, and after eight years there and three years at Siena College, he took over at St. Thomas Aquinas College. There, Anderson put together a 209–62 overall record, leading the Spartans to seven straight NCAA Division II tournament appearances. Shortly after FDU’s tournament run came to an end, Anderson decided to leave FDU and accepted the head coaching position at Iona. The Argus was able to chat with Tobin Anderson about his successes and his basketball journey.

The Argus: Between the Texas Southern win, the postgame speech that went viral, obviously the Purdue upset, and then accepting the job at Iona, there is just so much that has happened to you recently. Tell me a bit about what the last week [has] been like?

Tobin Anderson: It has been a whirlwind. From making the NCAA tournament, and then actually winning the first four games, and of course beating Purdue, there was so much buzz about us—saying we couldn’t beat Purdue and that made it more exciting and obviously having a chance to come close to advancing to the sweet 16. And then to come home and hopefully have a chance to relax and all of a sudden, I’m the head coach of Iona. So it’s just been an unbelievable amount of emotions and excitement for what happened…and what’s gonna happen next.

A: How did it feel playing a game in the First Four and being able to get the nerves out…against a team of Purdue’s caliber?

TA: It gives you an unreal amount of confidence. When you can play a game first…it gives you a significant advantage. The arena is packed, and Dayton does a great job, but there’s 14,000 people in that arena and it’s going crazy, so it would have been easy to let the pressure get the best of us. But we played really well and it gave us a shot of adrenaline. Like, “Hey, we belong here. We can play at this level.” And that was a huge part of us being able to beat Purdue…especially since at FDU we’re not used to playing in front of 14,000 people. But I am just really proud of how our guys handled the pressure and the scrutiny so well.

A: Against Purdue, you guys were the shortest team out of all 363 Division I teams in average height (6’1”). Purdue was number one in the nation in effective height per Kenpom. How did you prepare your team for this matchup? 

TA: Yeah, so we knew ahead of time that Zach Edey, his numbers are essentially the same in wins and losses. He averages 23 and 13 when they win and 24 and 13 when they lose. And of course, there are other guys with a big part, guys that when they won…played really well, and they lost when those guys didn’t play well. So our thought process was making Edey uncomfortable. Don’t make things easy for him. But more importantly, let’s try to do a great job with everybody else through our pressure and with our half court defense. And so I thought we did a great job. Our post guys were only about 6’5”. And it really isn’t easy to guard a guy like [Edey] no matter what. He was a first team All-American and a Big Ten player of the year. It takes a team effort, obviously, and we weren’t very big, but [Edey] didn’t like the fact that we were constantly surrounding him and it made him uncomfortable. Our guards were all over him, it took incredible attention to detail by our players, and I am really proud of them for that.

A: I remember watching the game. Every time it felt like FDU was going to cool off, Moore, Roberts, or any of the other guys would hit a clutch bucket. After each of these baskets, your only reaction was intensely reminding your team to continue pressing. I’m sure on the inside you were jumping up and down, but how did you focus on keeping your head in the game? 

TA: I could sense them getting tired, some of them getting a little bit tight especially as winning became more and more of a possibility. Sometimes you play not to lose, but I just wanted to remind our guys [to] keep doing what you’re doing. And I kept saying and even put it on the board before the game: “We play to win.” …I didn’t want us to relax or not take advantage of pressing, pushing the tempo and making them play at our speed. 

A: You always had belief in this team, but when in the game did it really sink in that “holy shit we’re going to do this?”

TA: It was about a minute to go and Shawn Moore hit a three at the top of the key to put us up by five. I’m a coach, but I am also a realist. Just like you and other fans, I was thinking they’re going to at some point pull away and they will put their foot down. Everyone would say great fight by FDU, they played so well, but at some point Purdue just knocked this away. But once [Moore] made that shot with a minute to go, I’m like, we might get this one. And that was the moment. I had some more confidence once our guys got one more stop. We made two big free throws from our point guards. We handled it like we’ve been there before.

A: You mentioned the three by Moore and the free throws by Roberts. Roberts, Singleton, and Moore were the guys who followed you from St. Thomas Aquinas to FDU. How did that whole situation play out when you got the FDU job? Were those guys ready to go right away, or did it take some time?

TA: It took a long time. They took a little bit of time to process. It was such a shocking thing when I left, because we planned all together to capture DII national titles. So there’s a little more emotion so that took a few days, once I got settled in at FDU, we knew we wanted those three guys. They knew they wanted to come on, I knew they’d be good players at this level, [but] I didn’t know they would be this good. So it all kind of came to fruition pretty well. And I’m happy for them because they get a chance to show people that the quality of basketball at the division II and division III levels are really good. And they got a chance to showcase that in an incredible environment.

A: At your last two jobs, St. Thomas Aquinas and Fairleigh Dickinson, you took over for programs that had five and four wins the year before you got there. Essentially, you were rebuilding the program. How does it feel to now enter a program that has made six out of the last seven tournaments, and which has just moved on from a legendary coach? 

TA: Every job is different. So no matter where you go, you have to figure out the people, we gotta figure out the program, what makes it tick, and how to be successful. …That’s why I’m here at Iona. That’s why the job is so attractive to me. They have a tradition of winning traditional success. …It goes on for years and years and years, lots of coaches have been successful. There’s a reason why you win. If you have good people around you, you will find success. And I still got to do the same thing. We’ve got to go in and figure out what it’s gonna take to get us going in the same direction and in our goals to do what we’re doing now. And in a high level of trying to even be better and to take the program to the next level and have a chance to go into NCAA games and have that kind of success.

A: You were a finalist for this position when they ultimately hired [Rick] Pitino. Has this been a job that has always appealed to you? And how does it feel to finally have landed it?

TA: To have the same footprint, to be in the same area, and [to] have the same recruiting base was really important. I’ve had three jobs in the last three years, but I haven’t had to move. I am still in the same house with my wife and kids. It’s nice to be in a situation where you can kind of be in the same spot.

A: You played college basketball at Wesleyan, where you became a 1,000-point scorer. Can you tell me a bit about your days playing at Wesleyan?

TA: I love Wesleyan. It was an incredible experience as a basketball player, a student, and as a person, I met some of the best people and learned so much. I loved playing basketball there. I mean, we had a great bunch of guys, we didn’t win as much as I’d like to win. So it was kind of an up and down. Like I personally had a pretty good four years, I would have liked a little more success, but also, the NESCAC is an unbelievable league. It’s hard to win in that league. So I had a standpoint of like, I could have chosen a better school but Wesleyan was the perfect place for me. …I learned as much out of the classroom as I did in the classroom. And then I met just wonderful people who I’m still friends with today and still talk to all the time and still keep in touch with and, and I can’t say enough great things about Wesleyan and I am a big supporter of Joe Riley and what they’ve done the last few years.

A: Have you had a chance to come back to campus recently? [Have] there been any big changes since you were there as a student?

TA: Yep, I was there last year for a few things. I’ve been there for a basketball game and a golf tournament. My plan is to come back this year for graduation, or for a reunion. …I played in Fayerweather gym which was super small. So they have the new gym and all of the new facilities are incredible. …It’s almost like a brand new campus. I still love the football field in the middle of campus and I get chills to walk around the campus and [think about] what influence Wesleyan [had] on me.

A: Do you have any favorite Wesleyan traditions or a specific moment you’ll always remember?

TA: Well, I remember going to WesWings all of the time. My buddy one time scored two goals in a soccer game, so I had to buy him a bucket of wings every night for a week. And I had little money to use so it cost me a fortune. But I loved Wes Wings. I love the baseball games. We had a great baseball team back then. Mark Woodworth ’94, who is the coach now, was a shortstop, and all those guys were great friends of mine. And I was a huge sports fan so those baseball guys were like a second team to me. I heard from Jed Hoyer ’95. Jed and I stay in touch so he texted me after the Purdue game. And so all those guys were just great guys. And I loved all the football games, baseball games, all those kinds of things. I’m always gonna be a huge Wes guy.

Sam Weitzman-Kurker can be reached at sweitzmankur@wesleyan.edu.