PURDUE UNIVERSITY FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

December 14, 2022

Ryan Walters

Mike Berghoff

Mike Bobinkski

Mitchell Daniels

Press Conference

MIKE BOBINSKI: First of all, thank you all for coming today. Welcome, everybody.

A couple of distinguished guests I make sure we want to recognize before we get into the business of the day here. I know we have President Daniels, President-Elect Chiang, I thank them so much for being with us today.

We have got some trustees here: Malcolm DeKryger, Gary Lehman. I don't know if JoAnne made it or not, but all of these folks are like really important parts to our success here in football, so really thank you for taking the time to be with us.

This is a -- hold on, hold on. It's a really exciting day for Purdue Football here and to temper that excitement, I'm going to invite Chairman Mike Berghoff up here of our board of trustees to say a few things.

Chairman Berghoff, it's all yours.

MIKE BERGHOFF: Good afternoon. As Mike said I'm Mike Berghoff, I'm chair of the board of trustees.

But first thing I want to do is thank our student athletes on the football team for managing this week with professionalism and class. Things happen quickly in a change like this and sometimes it can go off the rails in the locker room, but it didn't. So thank you, student athletes, because you enhanced our reputation by managing your week the way you did.

Another thing that enhances our reputation is winning, winning at the highest level, in sports, and academics.

And when we are out on a search with the athletic director, I just want you to know that your board, the president, the president-elect, the athletic staff is aligned in our commitment to winning and Coach is going to help us to do that.

Welcome, Coach, to you and your family.

MIKE BOBINSKI: Thank you, Mike, appreciate it very much and appreciate your help through the process.

So talk a little about where we are and what's going on these last couple days since the news broke last week that Coach Brohm was moving on.

This has been a distinctly different search than it was six years ago. Back then, we were presenting basically a reclamation project, and we were looking for a coach that was skilled enough and willing to take that on and we were fortunate to find that in Coach Brohm, and grateful for everything he did for us these last six years.

However, today, it's different. We had a different opportunity to present. It's now sustaining, growing and scaling our success to a brand new level. Just like six years ago, though, we had some baseline criteria, some things that are non-negotiables as we look for a next head coach, and that's first and foremost a leader of integrity: Somebody who is ethical, high character, has a strong academic orientation; as Mike mentioned, recognizing the strength of Purdue's academic mission and the priority of that, and making sure we never lose sight of that in what we do. This is college football by the way.

Intelligence. I always skew towards hiring the smartest people I can find. It bounces off my presence in the department, so it's a good thing; the history of success and growth in their career.

And then finally a belief in our opportunity in Purdue, not just in any opportunity but our opportunity here at Purdue is what happens most to us.

During the course of the search we had a chance to interact with a very healthy number of candidates, all of whom met the baseline criteria. We were really fortunate to have lots of great interest and then that's a really, really good thing.

We also thought back, okay, as Purdue has had success in years gone by in football, it's been when we have been able to do something distinctive, be innovative in some way, and so we thought about that as we began to evaluate candidates.

As we did that, one individual exceeded those baseline criteria by a mile but also brought the opportunity to do something distinctive and innovative.

Before I get into that a little bit more specifically about Coach Ryan Walters, I want to talk a little about how we view those things or how I view those things. So people go through life in different ways. There's the average football coaches like myself, there's the slightly above average, like Chairman Berghoff, who just kind of things -- life happens and you learn and grow from experiences that sort of occur to you on a day-in, day-out basis.

And then there are exceptional people who intentionally engage with each day and each experience. They have aspirations, they have goals, they have a motivation to achieve big thing in their life, and everything they do is focused on growing, being better than they were the day before and moving themselves towards those aspirations.

What we have sitting here today is an absolutely exceptional person in Ryan Walters. He is that person in every way.

The first ten minutes that we had a chance to visit with Ryan some -- four days ago, whenever that was, he recounted his career as a football coach, which began as the youngest Power Five assistant in the country at age 24 at the University of Arizona. And he talked about every stop that he's had along the way, how he grew, what he learned, how he approached each and every experience that he had.

That, again, to me, is the hallmark of an exceptional person, somebody who clearly has been on fast-forward. I mean, he has packed a tremendous amount of growth and perspective and reputational expansion over a relatively short but impactful 12 years as a college football coach.

In terms of distinctive, I talked again about how Purdue has been successful when we have been distinctive, when we have been innovative. Well, this coach's defense -- and I know that's a word that makes people nervous here for God's sakes. Like we don't want to play defense. But it is unique. It is disruptive. It's his defense. Like just as Coach Brohm brought his offense to us which caused people lots of problems over the last six years, Coach Walters is going to bring his defense. Not somebody else's. Not some variation on some other theme. It is his unique design. He keeps the secret recipe like the formula for Coke in his pocket. He doesn't share it with anybody else. In fact, he mentioned that it's fun to watch other people try to copy it because it doesn't quite look the same or feel the same, and he said, that's because I don't tell them how to really do it. Watching film is one thing, but knowing how to do it is something different.

By the way, I think we still intend to play offense. We are not just going to three-and-out and get back to playing 60 minutes for defense. We are going to play some real offense here. We know that, we know it's exciting. We love it, our fans love it, I love it, and I'll let Coach talk more about that as time goes by here.

The other chance that we have to be distinctive and innovative in my opinion, and that has a lot to do with the unique personality, sort of kind of the Pied Piper persona that Ryan has where people want to be around him. They want to work with him and relate to him in really, really good ways, is to build in my opinion the most connected and cohesive football organization in the country.

He will attract a high-performance staff that will be second-to-none. We have given him the opportunity and resources to do. So I know his phone is going crazy at this point with people that want to come work with him here at Purdue.

Being able to do that, being able to build that organization in that -- in that format, will be yet one more competitive advantage for us. There is no limitation on our ability to do that. That's just us. That's finding the right people, check creating the right culture, creating the right vibe in and around this building and everybody that touches our football organization.

I know this: Ryan Walters can and will do that. That's who he is. He knows nothing but high performance. He knows nothing but excellence, and I can't wait to see that get going -- it's already going to be honest with you, but to see it really take shape in the days ahead.

The last thing I'm going to say, we knew, and I knew very quickly what we had here in Ryan. But just yesterday in the afternoon that we had a chance to spend with Ryan and his family, you get a sense for somebody when you see him interact with their family. Wife, Tara, Aaron, Cason, two boys that are all boy and full-on, all gas, no brakes.

But watching them just as a family, the connection, the love, all of it, just meant, this is a real person. This is an authentic, genuine person we have got leading our program here.

I will stop right now. It's enough of me and I want to say it is my great pleasure to introduce Purdue's new head football coach and welcome Coach Ryan Walters, Tara, Aaron and Cason to the Purdue family.

Coach Walters, welcome.

RYAN WALTERS: Wow, this is real life, huh. This feels like a dream. I feel like I've been floating the past couple days but this is real and this is awesome. It's a dream come true.

You know first and foremost, I want to thank every player who has put on the old Gold and Black. You guys have made this program what it is. You are more than welcome to come back, please comeback and support this program. These doors are open to you till the end of time.

I'd like to thank AD Mike Bobinski, deputy AD Tiffini Grimes, board of trustees chairman Mike Berghoff, President Daniels and President-Elect Chiang for trusting me and believing in me to lead this program and be your new head football coach.

I would also like to thank Coach Brohm for his tenure here, his leadership here.

I'd like to thank the late Joe Tiller for setting the standard, what it means to be a successful coach at Purdue University.

I'd like to thank the University of Illinois and the Champaign and Urbana community for opening their arms and embracing my family and I these last two seasons.

I'd like to thank their administration and staff for providing a platform and an environment that allowed for growth. I'd like to thank Coach Bielema for pouring into me and being my mentor, telling me things that I didn't want to hear at times and also motivating me and encouraging me.

I'd like to thank those players in the locker room who poured their hearts out for us every day and did exactly what we asked them to do.

And I'd like to thank the defensive staff for sharpening me and challenging me on a daily basis.

I'd also like to thank my family, my wife, Tara, who has been by my side since I was a junior in high school, so I've been tricking her every day for a long time (Laughter).

I'd like to thank my two boys, Aaron and Cason, for letting Daddy doing what he does and chasing my dream. I hope that today you realize that it is possible to do whatever you want to do, man. Don't compromise for anybody and continue to chase those dreams until you reach them.

I'd also like to thank my parents, Mark and Nicole Walters, who grew up in Los Angeles, California, and started way, way, way too early. They had me when they were 16 in high school, and my Pops, he was a high school quarterback and got recruited to University of Colorado and played quarterback there.

So I grew up in the locker room. Football, it's in me. I grew up with a football attached to my hand and it just so happened that I was already bleeding black and gold.

As all young kids do, when they are introduced to this game, everybody wants to be a quarterback, right. So that's exactly what I wanted to do. My dad was a quarterback. I grew up watching quarterbacks. And I could still spin it a little bit.

So you fast-forward to 2001 where I'm a sophomore in high school, the starting varsity quarterback starting to get recruited on a national scale. And that was my first introduction to this university. Drew Brees was the quarterback here. He was accurate. He got the ball out on time. Scored a lot of touchdowns. And winter vacations, right, during Christmas break my family will go back to Los Angeles and spend time our family there. And I remember going to Disneyland and seeing Drew Brees in a parade in 2001 for the Rose Bowl, and I thought to myself, that's what I want do; that's what I want to be. I want to be a quarterback one day at a high-profile university. I want to go to the NFL and play quarterback. I wants to be a quarterback of a Super Bowl-winning team.

But things change, right. And change could be difficult at times and it was difficult for me then and we are in a changing time right now. It's not difficult because it's good or bad. It's difficult because it's different.

And there are some things that I know true about the game of football, right. I know that the quarterback position is the most important position in sports, period, and so one thing that will remain the same here that will not change is that we will have a cradle of quarterbacks and we will have identity (ph) defensive ends.

So offensively, what are we looking for, right. On offense, we will be creative. We will be explosive both in the air and on the ground. We will be strategically aggressive and we will put up points on the board and we will put them up in budges.

In defense, you already know how we get down. We'll confuse and harass the quarterback. We will stop the run. We are going to generate takeaways and momentum plays from snap to whistle. It is going to be organized chaos but from whistle to snap, it's going to be laser-like focus. We will first win games from not losing them, and you will be proud of the product that we put on the field on Saturdays.

Together with the staff that we are going to bring in with the administration, with this university and with y'all's support, we are going to build this program the right way, through hard work, through class, through integrity, and in unmatched competitive edge to go chase and win championships. We are not shying away from any of that.

Words can't describe how humbled and how excited I am to be your head football coach. Thank you for this opportunity and Boiler up.

MIKE BOBINSKI: President Daniels will come up and give a few remarks.

MITCHELL DANIELS: Yeah, Coach, things do change and sometimes fast. Seven days ago, I didn't think I could feel worse, and as of the last 72 hours, I couldn't feel better, for all the reasons Mike just -- Mike outlined and you just personified.

I'm so excited for what you are going to do here, and I am so confident about how good it going to be.

I have some very good news for you. I've only been able to be a part-time offensive coordinator (Laughter) I'm available full-time now and I've got lots of ideas that I know you're going to want to hear.

Welcome to the family. This is a family-oriented place. I hope you've already seen that. So I've already tendered Aaron a scholarship. We've got to watch Cason a couple more weeks but I think he's good for one. But we are really thrilled to have you.

Lastly, I will just say no one can be luckier than I have the last ten years to be associated with the finest athletic program in the country. Standards of conduct, academic standards and of course a competitive up and down, the 20 sports we compete in, finest athletic director in the country. I say that with full conviction.

So I'm just happy to say to my successor, Mung, you've got dealt the same great hand I did. This is going to be a great, great experience. I hope it will be adds great for you as I know you will make it for all us fans. Thank you.