NEW ORLEANS ? Joe Pasternack walked through the doors of the Homer L. Hitt Alumni Center, up the winding stairs to the facility ball room, and gladly shook hands with the local gathering of media, administrators, alumni and fans.
The New Orleans product was a head coach. A dream he had since he was in the fifth grade at Metairie Park Country Day had come true. Unfortunately, the 30-year old hardly had a chance to enjoy it.
Three days prior to his press conference, Pasternack was recruiting for the University of California as an assistant coach under one of his mentors ? Ben Braun. By Monday, he was in UNO blue ? selling himself and the Privateer program to everyone he could contact.
It was probably fitting, though. Pasternack has rarely had a chance to enjoy anything. He has had to work, admittedly harder than most coaches, to get where he is.
A little too vertically challenged to play basketball at the collegiate level, Pasternack knew that to reach his dream of being a college basketball coach, it would have to come the old fashioned way.
When thinking about where to attend college, Pasternack was not looking for the best business school. He was searching for a basketball teacher. And he knew where to start.
“If you want to be a lawyer, you go to Harvard,” Pasternack said. “I wanted to be a basketball coach. I wanted to learn from the best. I wanted to learn from Coach Knight.”
Bob Knight took Pasternack in as a student manager in 1995. There, Pasternack absorbed and wrote down everything he could learn from Knight. He spent four years at IU, getting an education on and off the basketball floor.
His persistence helped land a recommendation from Knight to Braun at Cal. Braun took a chance on the former manager and hired him as a video coordinator.
It really could not have worked out any better. Pasternack got to break down film, putting the kid into the critical world of game preparation. He got to learn, from another defensive-minded coach, how defense (not offense) wins championships.
His diligence helped land him a full-time assistant coaching gig at the Pac-10 school ? at the ripe, old age of 24.
Pasternack's role began to expand even more ? going from scouting reports to, eventually, the complex world of recruiting.
He was well on his way to reaching that dream of being a head coach.
In May of 2006, an opening popped up at UNO -- a school he had grown up watching.
He got an interview and was so impressive to search committee members. The detailed plan he had, the way he presented himself ? everything was there. He was young, not even 30, and was eventually edged by another eager young coach in Buzz Williams, who had a few more years experience.
A year later, an abrupt resignation came from Williams. Pasternack found out around noon on a Friday he was spending on the road recruiting. At 12:01, he was on the phone with Miller wanting to know what direction the AD was thinking of going.
His dream was about to come true.
He took the job a little more than 48 hours later. Two days later, he was being introduced as the Privateers' 11th head coach.
Some fans attending Pasternack's press conference probably had a déjà vu feeling as it was just a year ago that Williams was speaking to this crowd.
But there was something different about this guy. Unlike previous UNO coaches before him, Pasternack had a thorough knowledge of the history and tradition of UNO basketball. He saw it first-hand. He could remember, vividly, watching teams coached by Tim Floyd that tenaciously guarded every opponent on its way to the postseason.
He reminisced about a crowded Lakefront Arena, watching a Privateer team play against the who's who in college basketball.
The pessimist in some fans may have had the feeling that another coach may be coming in and ? with a little success ? going out.
But they don't know this guy. Joe Pasternack is coming home. And he's coming back to a place he has always wanted to be.
