Transcript
A (0:01)
Express yourself. I want to welcome everybody to a special edition of House Rules on a great day for my family. As you've probably seen, announcement came out today that we signed the contract extension to stay here at the University of Nebraska and we could not be more grateful. So before we even get started, I just. On behalf of Julie, on behalf of. On behalf of Bryant, Vivian Leone, I just want to extend my deepest appreciation to all the people that made this happen. Dr. Gold, Troy Dannon, everyone at university, certainly to the players and the coaches and all the hard work that they've done to get us to this point and to the entire state of Nebraska. At the end of the day, this was a decision about finding a home and staying here and making this our home. And we couldn't be more grateful. So I couldn't think of who else to share it with other than a person that since I've been here that I've had great conversations, spirited debates, and whose opinion I respect and trust. The one, the only, Damon Benning.
B (1:06)
I appreciate that, man. This is exciting for me as it is for hopefully you. I appreciate the opportunity. Congratulations, man. It's a load off my mind.
A (1:18)
Well, I'm now officially abdicating my role as podcaster. So now you're the podcaster now and I'll be the interviewee. And there's a lot of pressure off for me, too.
B (1:27)
So I don't know, you're pretty good at this as a natural speaker. I love the whole, you know, it's interesting, there's so many places this could go, but the house is not a home for me because I kind of told this story and sometimes when we talk, I never know what to say, what not to say, what I can't say. But generally speaking, I would just remember being on the official visit, you know, we'd already been on the visit, we'd already committed, and it was a huge weekend with Sanders Jr. And some of these guys and which, oh, boy, close. But you told this story about. And it was the one thing that resonated with me that I shared with our listening audience during the morning show. You explained the difference between a house and a home. And I couldn't believe you were so candid and forthright about not wanting to, you know, force feed Nebraska or Link or Omaha or the surrounding communities down recruits throats. You wanted them to feel like this was a home. And you, you going through the difference between what a house and a home is, especially using your own home and the. The homes in your neighborhood and with the TV like, you got to tell the listeners that story because that one was a little bit of one that tugged at the heartstrings.
A (2:47)
You know, I don't ever say the same thing twice, so it's. Sometimes it's hard to remember. But, you know, I think the, the message to the recruits was you can, you can go look at all the houses you want, you know, and this one has a great basement and this one has this. And that's kind of the recruiting process. But you really want to find a home. And you know, I look back in my life, you know, I have, I have the most amazing parents. You know, growing up, I never even saw my parents argue. That's, that's the house I grew up in. And you know, we lived, we lived in State College, Pennsylvania. Then we lived in Kansas City. My dad was in seminary, become a pastor. Then we moved to New York City and we lived in a two bedroom apartment on a place called Rosewood Island. And my sister and I shared a room. And then eventually we were able to move over to the next building over to get a three bedroom apartment. I would go across the street to some of my friends, houses that lived in, we were kind of in the rented houses and some of my friends had condos and co ops and things like that. And I'd go see their houses and maybe they had a bigger TV or maybe they had something else. But at the end of the day, like, I wouldn't, I wouldn't have traded my home for anything because my home was the people that were there. It was the, it was the love, it was the, it was the, it was the feeling. And then we moved to State College, Pennsylvania again and we lived in it. We rented a house there and that was a home that I wouldn't trade anything for. And then Julie and I, we get married and we live in a one bedroom apartment in Beverly Hills. And so I'm working at UCLA and she's paying the bills. And then we have this massive house in Texas. And then we moved to Charlotte and now we're here. It's like, like we've lived in different houses, but we've always had one home. And I think, you know, the key to being happy in life is, is to find people that you want to share your life with, to find a cause that you want to give your life to. And we came to Nebraska. Julie was like, this is where I want to raise the girls. This is where Bryant should be. And so that's, I think that's really, really powerful because I think when people see you as a coach, they think. See you as, like a cyborg. You're like, well, he's just on the field. After the game, I go home, I see my daughters. You know, I see my son, and. And they're way more important to me than anything else. And so I don't know if I'm saying that story right, but I just think that was. My message was like. Was like, yeah, like, hey, we have a great house here. Like, we got great bones. We got a great. But the true greatness of this building is Corey Campbell is. Mike Eckler is Kristen Coggin, is all the people that make this your home. And then you walk outside on the campus, all the people on this campus that make this your home. Then you walk into Lincoln or you go over to Omaha or you go to Carney, or you go. It's all the people that make this our home. And when you have a home, like, when you have a house, man, like, sometimes it burns down. You'll run, right? Like, and then just build a new one, but you'll defend your home. And so we found our home, man.