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RUTGERS UNIVERSITY FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

December 7, 2015

Piscataway, New Jersey

THE MODERATOR: Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. And welcome to today's press conference to announce the new head football coach for Rutgers, Chris Ash.

We are joined today by Rutgers president, Robert Barchi, director of athletics Pat Hobbs. We'll begin the press conference with opening remarks from Barchi, Mr. Hobbs, followed by remarks from Coach Ash.

DR. BARCHI: I'm delighted to be here and I want to welcome you all. Thank you for coming to this memorable day and our introduction of Chris Ash as our new head coach.

I'm going to turn the day over to Pat Hobbs to do the in-depth introduction and to tell you all about this outstanding individual who is coming to Rutgers. But before I do, there's just a couple things that I wanted to say.

Over the course of the last week, I've had a chance to spend a fair amount of time with Chris, and I have to say that I have come to the firm belief that he's the right person for this job. He's the right person for this job because he has an intense and passionate commitment to excellence and integrity on the field, and he has that same level of commitment to see excellence and integrity in his players, both in their daily lives and in the classroom and that's just what we need here, that combination, here at Rutgers. I must say that he blew me away with his track record. He spent 19 years at the very top level of competition in intercollegiate football in this country, and you'll hear a lot more about that in a minute.

But what impressed me was the fact that during those 19 years, he's won the respect of his fellow coaches and his colleagues. The student athletes who have played with him and against him and the opponents across the board. I'm just thrilled that Chris is the one who is going to come and lead our football program from what I think is really a transitional, pivotal point in Rutgers history moving forward to a new chapter in our athletic program.

But before I turn it over to Pat and let him go to town on this, I just want to say one little thing about our new AD. He's been here for seven days now, and I must say that he has been going nonstop, a hundred miles an hour, 24/7 since he hit the ground last Monday. He's the one who brought this recruitment home and he's the one that was crisscrossing the country and he was the one that was bringing the information back to me and to our board chairman and the chairman of our athletics board to discuss it. But this is his recruitment and I think he deserves a tremendous amount of thanks and appreciation from Rutgers for doing that.

So, Pat, thank you for your efforts and I'm going to turn it over to you.

PAT HOBBS: Thank you Dr. Barchi. So this is a great day for Rutgers university. We get to welcome our new coach, Chris Ash, but we also get to welcome his wife, door even. Doreen, welcome to Rutgers university. Her son, Brady, sitting -- seven-month old Brady who is sitting there with full Rutgers regalia already which is terrific. Tanner, who is 14-year-old recovering from a little ACL. He's already -- he's been there already. He's in the training room. He's a d-back and receiver already in football, so we welcome all. And Coach's daughter, JC, couldn't be with us, but we welcome the Ash family. Delighted to have you all here at Rutgers University. Beverly, Doreen's mom, is over here, as well. Welcome everyone.

I do want to say a word of thanks before I talk about Coach Ash, to say thank you publically to Dr. Barchi for the opportunity to lead Rutgers athletics. This is a tremendous group of people here. As he said, I've been on the job just about a week but just meeting the people here, the coaches, the administrators, they love Rutgers university. They want Rutgers university to succeed, and we are all going to work tirelessly to make that happen.

I do want to also say two more words of thanks. I want to thank our board chairman, Greg Brown. He works tirelessly for this university. Tremendous asset to this university. Tremendous leader of our board and very, very supportive. As well as the chairman of our athletic committee, Ken Schmidt, just a great guy, a great guy to be there and support and to provide counsel whenever needed.

So as I said, this is a great day for Rutgers University. Last Monday when I was asked what I was looking for in a new coach, I said, our next coach has to be a great ambassador for our university; someone who can lead young men, someone who will get our fans hopeful and excited again about Rutgers football. I found that person in Chris Ash.

I don't need to give you his resumÃ© of accomplishments; 19 years of collegiate coaching, five years in the Big Ten with four Big Ten Championships, conference championships and a National Championship. What I will tell you is that Chris Ash is a man of commitment, character and integrity. What most impressed me was his belief and confidence in the possibilities of Rutgers football.

He has considered every aspect of what it takes to have a successful football program here at Rutgers, and will bring all that he has learned and the best practices of the incredible coaches he has worked for, including guys who have come from the Hayden Fry tree, Dan McCarney, Chuck Long, Bret Bielema, and of course the last two years, under Urban Meyer.

I was incredibly impressed with his definition of what it means to care for our student athletes, who he met for the first time this morning at 7:00 A.M. and no one was late. Under Coach Ash, our student athletes will receive the best training, the best strength and conditioning. He will ensure that they take full advantage of the world-class education we offer here at Rutgers university. And he and his staff will prepare them for life after football. That is how caring is defined. This is not an easy job. There is a lot to do to bring us to the level of competitiveness and excellence we all want.

Chris Ash is the right man to lead that effort. In his book, Above the Line, Lessons in Leadership From a Championship Season, Urban Meyer wrote, "A true leader is someone who is going someplace and taking people with him. A catalyst for elite performance who enables people to achieve things they couldn't otherwise achieve on their own. A leader is someone who earns trust, sets a clear standard, and then equips and inspires people to meet that standard."

It is my pleasure to introduce the leader of Rutgers football, Chris Ash.

COACH ASH: Thank you, Pat, for that introduction. I'm going to try to lighten this room up a little bit. There's a lot of serious looks in here and we have to get some smiles going here at Rutgers right now.

To say that I am honored and excited to be the new head coach here at Rutgers would be an understatement. When I started my coaching journey back in 1995, this was a dream that I set out to try to achieve to some day have an opportunity to lead my own program.

Ironically, when that journey started, one of the states that I started in was here in New Jersey. It was a short stay when I worked at Princeton University but I became very fond of the state, this area, and what it has to offer. I've been back many times both to visit and to recruit, and I am extremely excited and thrilled to be the new head football coach of this State's university here at Rutgers.

On behalf of myself and my family, I thank everybody that was involved with the process. It was fun. It was exciting. It was thorough. It was detailed and it was very, very fast here this week the way it went.

Pat Hobbs, I appreciate your professionalism, the opportunity to work alongside of you and do great things here at Rutgers. Dr. Barchi, I appreciate everything you have done throughout this process. You've been very first class and professional and excited to work under your leadership here at the university.

I have some other thank-yous I would like to mention here before I get started. Pat had already mentioned my family. Every coach in this profession talks about a coach's wife and how they have the best coach's wife. I'm going to be another one to tell you, I have the best coach's wife there is in America. Try not to get emotional, but it might not work.

But Doreen, thank you, I couldn't be here without you. We've had a lot of great times. We've had ups and downs and moved around and she's been alongside me the whole time and I really appreciate everything she's done for me.

My son, Tanner, has been great. He had two questions about Rutgers before I took this job. First thing he said, "Dad, can we win?"

I said, "Yeah, we can win."

And the only other thing he cared about, "Can we get ranked sometime, Dad?"

I said, "Yeah, we can get ranked."

And he said, "Take the job." So we did. Son, Brady and mother-in-law, Bev, thank you for your support and everything you've done for myself and my family. My daughter who is not here with us, JC, I know she'll be watching. She'll love to be a Rutgers fan. She's going to get some gear and she can't wait to get out here to see our new home and meet our new team, so very excited about that.

Moving forward, I have a message for fans, supporters, administrators, players, basically anybody that loves this program: We need to create some positive energy around this program. It's going to take an extreme amount of, would. It's going to take a lot of the right people going in the same direction. Organizational alignment here in this athletic department and in this football program is going to be essential to our success.

Everybody is going to have a role. And I'm asking that everybody be the best that they can be at whatever job that is that you have to do; for us and this program to reach our goals of being one of the best football teams in a great conference here in the Big Ten.

I want to build a first-class program here, a program that the university, the State of New Jersey, high school coaches and high school players can be proud to say that this program is theirs and they want to come here and be a part of it. We don't need New Jersey kids and players going to other programs. We need to keep them here at home at Rutgers and be the best that we can be here.

What I'm looking for in this football team, okay, I want to build a fast, physical team that plays with relentless effort, tremendous enthusiasm, and plays for each other. I want our opponents to turn on the film and say, you know what, this is a real one. We'd better strap it on because these guys are going to come and they are going to play hard. They are going to play together, and they are going to play for four quarters. And that's the type of program that I want to try to build here at Rutgers.

How do we do that? It starts by hiring first-class people on the coaching staff in the positions to lead these young men. It's going to go to our culture. The culture here at Rutgers will give us a chance for success. The culture will beat strategy every single time. We have to get the right culture here within our locker room and within our meeting room and on the field with these players.

But it's going to take great people and it's going to take the right culture and it's going to take alignment by everybody involved, and if we do that, we'll have a chance for success.

Our mission statement, it won't include anything about wins, it won't include anything about championships. It's going to include and talk about the environment we're going to create to develop these players mentally, physically and spiritually to reach their full potential and to be successful in life after football, and if we can get that ton, the wins will come.

I can't tell you again how excited I am to be here. I can't wait to get going. They were trying to talk to me about the press conference and all the things with today. I just want to go recruit and have an opportunity to get some better players or more players in our program and get us moving in the right direction.

And with that, I'll open up for questions.

Q. You come from a place where winning a National Championship is the goal every year. Is that realistic here at Rutgers?
COACH ASH: You know, we're not going to make a lot of goals that talk about results with winning games and championships. We're going to worry about making goals that make us better tomorrow than we were today. That's all it's going to be about.

The wins will come. Hopefully championships will come. But that's not my focus. That's not going to be the program's goal, at least early on. It's about getting better every single day.

Q. We've heard that you're still going to coach as the defensive coordinator for Ohio State in the Bowl game. How did that come about and how do you see the next couple weeks working with a split focus?
COACH ASH: Yeah, I guess it's been a hot topic but I wouldn't do it any other way. If I had an opportunity to become a head coach, the reason I have that opportunity is because of the people at Ohio State. Gene Smith has been tremendous to me and my family.

I can't say enough about what Coach Meyer has done for me. Those players there have been unbelievable, and I would not feel right if I didn't help them finish the job that I started. I would ask the same of any assistant coach that would be in my program that would have the same opportunity, and I'm going to go back and help those guys try to finish out the right way.

I've witnessed this three different times. When I was at Wisconsin, Dave Doeren took the Northern Illinois job when we were going to the Rose Bowl, he finished out. I watched Paul Crist get the Pitt job when we were going to the Rose Bowl, and I watched him finish it out. And last year, Tom Herman got the Houston job when we were in the playoff run and I watched him finish it out.

I understand it will be a challenge but I'm up to the task and I can promise all Rutgers fans and players that the days that I'm back in Columbus to help with the preparations for the Bowl game will not take away from what we're trying to build here (applause).

Q. You mentioned wanting to get out and recruit right away. What are your plans for this week, and talking to the 2016 class, and then for the official visits coming up?
COACH ASH: I can start to get on the phone right away. You know as a head coach you can only make one home visit or one school visit at this time. So I've got to be very cautious about where I go and who I go see, because I want to make sure that I get a staff in place and that I can go with position coaches and coordinators to try to recruit individuals in the month of January.

But we have some players that may potentially be mid-year enrollees that I need to get out and see. This is the only opportunity for me to be able to do that, and I plan on doing that this week.

Q. We've been able to see your defensive philosophy up close in games. I'm curious what you hope to bring offensively and what your feelings on that are?
COACH ASH: A lot of questions about that, also. As a defensive coach, I faced a lot of different types of offenses, and I know what I want to see offensively. I know what hurts defenses. I know what I don't want to see each week.

I can tell you this about the offense: We'll have an offense that can score points. It's going to be exciting and it's going to be fun to watch and it's going to be one that players are going to want to be a part of and fans are going to want to watch and show up every Saturday on the field. We're going to be multiple. We're going to have several different ways to attack a defense and that's about where I'll leave it there.

Q. What will you demand of your student athletes on and off the field?
COACH ASH: What I'm looking for from our student athletes are commitment, accountability, great effort in everything that they do. I'm asking them to make great decisions. They have got to be a great teammate. They have got to be able to be trusted. And if we can do those things, then the rest will take care of itself.

Q. Can you give us a sense of what your impression was of Rutgers? Obviously it's had some rough times in the national spotlight, so did you have any reaction to that stuff? Did you have to be sold on the job or did you know enough about it that you knew you wanted it right away?
COACH ASH: Well, speak to about being sold to take a job. I was fortunate enough to be around a lot of really good coaches, head coaches, that have mentored me along the way and given me a lot of advice. And one of the things that I was told a long time ago, if you're going to take a job, make sure it's a job that you're willing to run to. And this was a job, I don't care what's happened in the past, this was a job I'm willing to run to. This is a job that has tremendous potential.

There's a ton of talent here in this State of New Jersey. I have competed against this team for the last three years. I know what type of talent is in this room right now, okay. We've got some work to do to build the right culture, build the right chemistry, and get maximum effort out of these players. But this is a job, I didn't have to be talked into this at all. I actually would have passed up on some other opportunities to have a chance to come here and I'm excited about it.

Q. What's the key to recruiting New Jersey? You spoke about talent there. What's the key?
COACH ASH: I think the first key is the people that we bring into the program. Hired a first class staff that cares about players, does things the right way. Develops the players to be the best that they can be. I think that's where it starts.

People ask me about going into homes and living rooms here in New Jersey because I'm not from here. I've been able to do that all across the country, East Coast, West Coast, down in the south, it doesn't matter. I think it's about being yourself, being honest, being straightforward, building a connection and really selling what you're trying to do, what your vision of the program is and what you want to try to accomplish.

But it's about the people more so than anything, and the way that we take care of our players. Because at the end of the day, a coach can say, well, I am the greatest recruiter ever, but it's really our players that have to become our best recruiters, and as long as we take care of them, develop them the right way and have the right type of culture, when we bring a recruit here on campus, they are going to feel the energy and the excitement and the way the players feel about our staff and the way we do our business and that I think that's the way we have to go about it.

Q. Obviously your first job as a head coach, so how different do you think it's going to be? What's it going to be like for you taking this next step?
COACH ASH: At the end of the day, the buck stops with me. I have to make decisions that typically as a coordinator or a position coach, you don't have to make. My name will be all over the newspapers for the good times and for the bad. But other than that, it's football. It's coaching.

There's some other duties and responsibilities that a head coach has to do with going out and meeting with supporters and boosters and former players and things like that. I have been planning the way I would attack a job for a long time. I have very strong thoughts and beliefs on how I want to operate the program and how we will attack each day.

I feel like I'm more than ready and prepared to do this job.

Q. Where are you with your assistant coaches? Have you met with the ones that are still on staff here and have you reached out to anybody who you would like to bring with you?
COACH ASH: The first thing I'm going to do when the press conference is over have an opportunity to meet with the coaches that were on staff here already.

Transition is never easy. I do have some guys that I would like to try to work with at some point. But what I'm looking for in a staff to be honest with you are guys that are aligned with my vision, have great character, they can build connections with the current players and recruits, they are compatible with me and they have had successful experiences.

When I sit down and meet with the coaches on this staff, if I feel that any of those coaches can be a part of what I'm trying to build, then I'll have an opportunity -- then they will have an opportunity to potentially join the staff. But I will make no comments about who I would keep, who I would not keep or what direction I'm going.

Q. I wanted to know if you've seen overall the facilities, what your take on it is, and going forward, just your take on the facilities here at Rutgers.
COACH ASH: I think it's an outstanding facility. Last night was my first opportunity to go through the facility, and I was blown away to be honest with you. I had never been here before. Didn't know what to expect. Very nice facility. User-friendly. One of the things that Pat and I talked about in this whole process when we talk about facilities, we don't necessarily right now feel that we have to be the best in the country, but what we need to try to do is identify things that we can give our players to reach their full potential and feel like they are in a first-class organization.

There are some minor things that in time that I might want to tweak and adjust but right now I'm blown away. I look at this team room that we have that we are sitting in. This is one of the nicest team rooms I've been in in any job that I've been. I look at the meeting rooms, the weight room, fantastic facility. Great foundation here to do something great with.

Q. How do you feel like the current roster fits what you want to do, and will that be a gradual change to get to your schemes or do you go right into it?
COACH ASH: To comment on the current roster, it would be hard to do that. I do have some sort of an opinion because we played Rutgers the last three years. But for me, we will implement the things that we think we need to to be successful and what we have on the roster from a personnel standpoint we will take into account to give ourselves a chance to be successful as early as we can.

Q. Having recruited at different schools, do you have any preexisting relationship with any of the guys here on the team and how has that first initiation been with those guys?
COACH ASH: I do not have any existing relationships with the players that are currently on the team.

Pat mentioned we had a team meeting this morning at 7:00 A.M. I've been through these transitions before. Typically there's a player or players that are not on time, players slouching down in their seats, guys that just act like they are disinterested.

I came into this meeting this morning at 7:00 A.M.: All the players were here at 6:55 A.M. All of them were sitting up in their chairs. All of them were eager to hear what the new head football coach had to say about the vision and the plan for the program moving for. I couldn't be happier with what I saw this morning and the response that I received from the players.

Q. I wanted to ask a question for Pat, the whole search process, was a deep candidate pool? How did that whole process go?
PAT HOBBS: So we had assistance from an outside firm, Bob Beaudine, I don't know if I mentioned earlier, Bob was a tremendous asset to the search process. So we looked at a lot of possibilities for our coaching position and then did a lot of due diligence work as Dr. Barchi said. There wasn't a lot of sleep in the last week, but you want to make the right decision.

Interviewed a number of candidates after filtering through that, and I will tell you, it just became clear very early in that process that Chris Ash was the right person. In 25 years in higher education, he's the single best interview I've had with any individual. And I say that not because it was a polish or like an interview technique.

He is the person that came to this with the most knowledge of Rutgers and where we are, with a plan in his head for how we were going to attack this and what we were going to do; with clear thoughts about the type of staff that would have to be put together. I can't tell you, I wish if I could have recorded that interview, I would play it for people just to see if you want to interview for a job and you want to know how to prepare for a job, this is what you do.

Of course that's the interview, right. And then you have to have confidence that this is the right individual. And if you look across Chris Ash's career as a coach and what he's done with defenses, obviously at the schools that he's been, the dramatic improvement. So it's not simply what somebody says. My father used to say, there's lots of people who know but then there's those who can do. Everywhere he's been, he's done. He's come into Rutgers and I'm fully confident that he's going to do it.

Q. Obviously this year has been a tough one for Rutgers, arrest, suspensions, a bad image problem around the country. How do you change that image here?
COACH ASH: It takes time. And we want to create a culture that tries to educate the players on how to make the right decisions, but it will take time. It will start by clearly defining what our culture is going to be. It will take time to clearly educate, communicate and motivate those players to make the right decisions and make those decisions for the right reasons because of the other team members that are in this room with them.

We want guys to be able to make the right decisions because they know if they make the wrong one, it's going to let down one of their brothers, one of their teammates. And that doesn't happen overnight. Doesn't happen because I walked in the door. But it starts with having clearly defined culture, clearly defined expectations, constant communication, constant education and constant motivation about doing the right thing on and off the field.

Q. I just wanted to confirm: So you did not do any of the interview process on campus?
COACH ASH: I have not been on campus before until last night.

Q. So just kind of walk us through when in your mind you made the decision and when it all came together, when you got here, what you did last night through to this morning, how much of the campus you've seen, things like that.
COACH ASH: Well, it all started with the phone call, like Pat said, early last week. I had initial phone conversation. It went great. Later on in the week, received another phone call from Pat saying that they would like to discuss further about my possibilities of having interests in coming to Rutgers.

We had a meeting. It went extremely well. I really liked meeting Pat in person. I liked what he had to say about his vision for the program. I liked all the research that I had done about Rutgers and the State of New Jersey, the high school players, the coaches, all of that. I was really fired up about it. It was one of those jobs I knew if I could get an opportunity to get the offer, I was coming.

I didn't need to come here on campus. I've been here on campus. I've been in the stadium. I know what kind of environment is created on a Saturday night here in this stadium. It's not a fun place to play, it's not an easy place to play, and I'm excited about that.

Once I got here on campus last night, we met Pat over here. My wife and I met Pat over here and it was our first opportunity to tour through the facility and was blown away by what I saw and the possibilities, the potential that we have here.

This morning, as I mentioned already, I had a chance to meet the team. Again, another really positive experience, was blown away by their reception and their attention, and their eagerness to want to try to improve themselves so it improves the football team and willingness to do whatever they are asked to do to make that happen.

Throughout the rest of the morning, the morning was spent just meeting other people here in the facility, other support staff, people here in the facility, and really impressed with the quality of people that are here.

PAT HOBBS: And I would add that I was blown away. It was first time I saw our facilities. (Laughter).

Q. Could you talk about what you identify as the single biggest challenge that you face coming into this position, No. 1. And two, talk about integrating academics into the program because you made that a key point.
COACH ASH: To identify the biggest challenge, that would probably be a mistake for me to try to do. There's a long list of them. Getting through this press conference is probably No. 1 to start, but you guys are -- I heard all this stuff about the New Jersey media and East Coast media. You guys are tame. Come on, I'm looking for the hard questions (laughter).

I do have to tell you, though, and I'm going to answer your question in a second. I do have to tell you, though, my first day on the job, there was a positive newspaper article. So I'm going to frame that one. So I'm excited about that. (Applause).

But the academics here in this football program are going to be very important. We're going to recruit players that take education very serious and want to get a degree, and we're going to do everything we can. We're going to come employ by the Big Ten and NCAA rules in everything we do and make sure our players walk out of here with a degree, a meaningful degree and have an opportunity to set themselves up for employment when they are done here in this program.

We want the players to understand that this is a very powerful university, one that has a lot of potential to help them gain placement, build a network for a lifetime and want to make sure they take full advantage of that.

Obviously the experience they have on the field, we hope is a positive one but there's so many other things that this university can provide from the educational standpoint that they take advantage of it during their time here.

Q. Greg Schiano's stamp, even when Kyle was here, has been on this program for a good 15 years now, and the success they have had over the last ten or so is unrivalled in the program's history. How do you embrace that and at the same time put your own stamp on it with a lot more room for success?
COACH ASH: It's a good question. Greg is a very intelligent football coach, unbelievable man. What he did here for Rutgers, quite honestly, if I could even come close to that, I would be pretty excited.

I have gotten to know Greg in the last couple years in my time at Ohio State. Had an opportunity to visit with him on several occasions. We talked about Rutgers in the past and what he did here and how he did it. I look forward to having an opportunity to talk to him again here in the near future and pick his brain on a couple things.

But I'm not trying to compare myself to anybody else. I'm not trying to compare myself to what's happened in the past. I'm trying to make us better each and every day that I can, and I'm trying to be the best head coach that I can be for these players. If at the end of the day when it's all done, if we have a great program that can be comparable to what Coach Schiano built here, it will be a pretty good place.

Q. Could you lead us to how you came across Chris originally? Was it through the search firm? How did he get into the search?
PAT HOBBS: So when Dr. Barchi and I started talking about whether I might come on here as athletic director, and then that progressed, and on Saturday evening I sort of knew what the decisions were and where we were going, I think I spent, I can't tell you how many hours reading just about every article on who are the best coaching prospects in the country.

Then we worked with Bob Beaudine of Eastman Beaudine, really can't say enough about the work that they did to identify candidates. You know, Chris right away was on the list in terms of first-tier candidates for us. I don't want to get into a lot of detail about -- but you start doing the due diligence and start making calls and start asking people what they know about individuals.

Fortunately, because of my background in sports in the past, developed a lot of friends in college athletics who you can pick up the phone, ADs, other people and say, I'm looking at this person what do you think.

Just overwhelmingly, you've got to look at that guy, look at that guy hard. Toward the end of the process, look, I've been entrusted with a tremendous responsibility here as Rutgers. So I wanted to make sure that Chris had an opportunity to talk to Dr. Barchi, to Greg brown, to Ken Schmidt. They all saw what I saw. So just terrific. Great result.

Q. Obviously Chris is making a significant raise over what Kyle was making and the assistant coach pool went up. What led to that kind of financial commitment to the program?
DR. BARCHI: I've said many times that my commitment to the program from the point of view of support is to make this program as competitive as it can be. I want a program that's going to succeed in the Big Ten. I want a program that's going to grow into a full equity partner in the Big Ten and that's going to take some increased investment as we move forward.

I think that what we've done is a measured and reasoned step in that direction, and we remain committed to it.

PAT HOBBS: What I would add, if you put a great product on the field, if people see the possibility of Rutgers football, they believe in what you're going to accomplish as Rutgers football -- and I agree with Coach. That's not necessarily measured in wins and losses, but you see that and they build in enthusiasm.

The support that comes from your base at that point, more than makes up for any additional financial commitment. Obviously being part of the Big Ten, that's going to make a very big difference in terms of our future financially. But I have to be now about fund-raising, not just for this program but for all of Rutgers athletics.

This is a new time. What I'm committed to is a new time, a new chapter and that new chapter, I'm going to be inviting a lot of people to invest in our future and I'm very confident that every investment we are making today is going to pay dividends, great dividends, in the future.

Q. Did you have to clear the decision to coach Ohio State through the Bowl game? I'll admit to being one of those who was a little bit curious about that decision. I thought just because of the nature of how much has to be done here, it seems to me this is a full-time job on its own. So I was curious if that was something you had to clear.
PAT HOBBS: Absolutely. We talked about it. You heard why Chris thought it was important. But it's important for another reason, as well. I want people to know that Chris Ash has accepted the Rutgers position. I want that announced on national television that Chris Ash is coming to Rutgers University. It says something about what he sees and it says something about what we believe in the possibility of Rutgers university.

We are going to get the full efforts of Chris Ash between now and when he comes on board after the Bowl. There's dead times. There's things that, periods of times -- so he's going to give his attention to Rutgers University.

And I agree with what he says. When you show loyalty to an institution that's giving you an opportunity; and I hope that that's what will happen when some day he has assistants who say, I've been provided an opportunity and we have a Bowl game coming up, we'll want that same type of loyalty. It just says something also about the man, and only added to the reasons why I thought he's absolutely the right choice for us.

Q. Your son wants wins, and he wants to be ranked.
COACH ASH: Yeah, how about that.

Q. What you do want and what would be your short-term and long-term goals?
COACH ASH: As I mentioned before, I want to build a first-class program at the university and the state and the people that live here and support us, are happy and proud to say they are part of the Rutgers football program. That's what I want at the end of the day.

If I can do that, the wins will come, a ranking will come, all of those things that everybody wants, and how I'm going to ultimately be measured here will come. But there's a process to get to that.

And I just want to make sure that we're better every single day, we're moving in the right direction; that the organization is aligned, we've got the right culture in place, we're recruiting the right type of people, hiring the right type of staff. And at the end of the day, the wins and the rankings and Bowl games and all of the things that fans want will be there.

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