No. 16 Fairleigh Dickinson pulled off perhaps the biggest upset in March Madness history, defeating No. 1 Purdue in the opening round of the NCAA tournament.
This victory will go down in history books for college basketball, as the No. 16 seeds were 1-150 against No. 1 seeds in the men’s tournament heading into this game. While it was huge for everyone, this looked was an especially historic win for first-year FDU head coach Tobin Anderson.
Before the game, fans saw a video of Anderson telling his team the more he had a chance to watch Purdue, the more he became convinced his team could beat them.
While the opposing players on Purdue found his comments disrespectful, now the FDU coach looks brilliant for boldly declaring such confidence:
"The more I watch Purdue, the more I think we can beat them."
Two days ago, FDU head coach Tobin Anderson spoke tonight's win into existence 🔥pic.twitter.com/4koDOJrlj3
— CBS Sports (@CBSSports) March 18, 2023
Anderson is a former Division II coach who won six East Coast Conference titles at St. Thomas Aquinas College in New York between 2016 and 2022.
While he searched for a head coaching gig, he was told that he needed to get hired as an assistant coach for a Division I team before he was offered a head coaching vacancy.
But he is clearly used to shocking the world: He got the gig at FDU. While they had just four wind last season, he led them to the tournament during his first year on the job.
This interview with Tobin Anderson is everything ❤️ @FDUKnightsMBB
"That's unbelievable. We just shocked the world!" pic.twitter.com/9B7sUPzdbH
— CBS Sports College Basketball 🏀 (@CBSSportsCBB) March 18, 2023
After the game, Anderson elaborated on why he said it:
“I just trust our guys, I have faith in our guys … We just have faith in what we do. Our guys are so tough and so competitive. I’ll do a better job in this locker room speech than the last one … It was the right message, it made the wrong audience. But listen: I love our guys. They’re tough, they’re gritty, they play their tails off.”
FDU will play the winner of Memphis – Florida Atlantic. We’ll see if we can get another prediction from Anderson about how his team would stack up vs. either squad.
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