ST. LOUIS (KMOX) - Josh Schertz has been to St. Louis plenty of times before during his as the Head Coach of Indiana State Sycamores, but now he will be around St. Louis a lot more as head coach of the Saint Louis Billikens.
On Monday Saint Louis University officially introduced Schertz as the next head coach of the Billikens and the University says hiring Schertz was easy as they saw someone who was not only a winner, but someone who was an authentic leader and someone who fit the school's values.
"We talked with Josh early on in the process about our values and that starts with trust," said SLU Athletic Director Chris May. "I was so proud (Sunday) that within the first two minutes of Schertz's conversation with the team, he talked about about trust in a coach and a student athlete. When I saw that, that reaffirmed that we were in the right place."
Schertz credited the University for being careful with the process, especially when Indiana State was still in the middle of postseason play in the NIT tournament.
"It was interesting to say the least post-Missouri Valley Tournament," said Schertz. "(May) did an amazing job of making me a priority, showing me how committed he was, letting me learn about the values without trying to push me or put me in a situation where I felt pressured to make a decision and that's an incredibly hard needle to thread and he navigated that beautifully."
Schertz says that the benefits of Indiana State being able to reach the NIT Final was able to help him forge a relationship with the school
"I felt as time went on, it felt right," said Schertz. "Because (Indiana State) played so long, I was able to forge a great relationship with May, (SLU President) Fred Pastello, and (Richard A. Chafeitz)."
Schertz highlighted what impressed him the most during his introductory press conference Monday was the quality of resources that the University provided.
"I think their are shared values, like what you see in the Champions Center, about not just the transactional piece of this, but the wholelistic development of our student athletes matter to SLU and to me," said Schertz. "You can just as you walk through there the different resources, facilities from nutrition, to counseling to sports psychology, etc."