On Friday morning, Gene Cross was riding down the turnpike heading east to Toledo and practicing his introductory speech over the phone to longtime friend Cliff Warren, the men's basketball coach at Jacksonville University.

Warren heard the voice of Cross' mother, Haroleon Cross, in the background in the car and gave Gene advice he would later eschew: Don't look at your mother during your speech or you'll get emotional.

Gene told him, "I'm getting emotional now."

The new University of Toledo men's basketball coach calls himself "the biggest mama's boy there is," but that wasn't the sole reason for the feelings on the drive over from South Bend and during his speech. It was the thought that kept crossing his mind: "This is the job I was supposed to get."

"He and I talked all the time about what it's going to take to get a job," Warren said. "He's thankful and honored and I think he's going to cherish it for a very long time."

Cross is a guy who puts his team's grade point average on his resume. He's a crazy yet efficient driver in his hometown city of Chicago. He's a Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity brother. He's Haroleon's only child.   more »