Jake Diebler officially signed his contract to become Ohio State’s head coach in a meeting with Ross Bjork and his players.
Ohio State shared video of the moment on Sunday afternoon, showing Bjork introduce Diebler to the Ohio State men’s basketball team as its new head coach before Diebler signed his term sheet in front of the players, who smiled at the news that their interim coach – who joined the Buckeyes in 2019 as an assistant coach – will remain the Buckeyes’ head coach going forward.
The moment we made it official with Head Coach @JakeDiebler
— Ohio State Hoops (@OhioStateHoops) March 17, 2024
Hear @RossBjorkAD and @JakeDiebler address the team this afternoon to announce the news.#GoBucks pic.twitter.com/9J7iraFEWQ
After signing the contract, Diebler showed his appreciation to his players for helping him become the head coach, which came after Ohio State went 6-2 in its last eight games following Chris Holtmann’s firing.
“This doesn’t happen without you guys,” Diebler said, pounding his fist against a whiteboard with the word ‘Family’ written on it. “You guys know me and you know what this place means to me. You know how much I love it here. You know how much I want to win a championship here. From the absolute bottom of my heart, to each and every one of you, thank you. This is a blessing, this is my dream. This is a dream job, this is a day I’ll never, ever forget. And I’m glad you guys are all here to be a part of it.”
Bjork made it clear during the meeting that his expectation in hiring Diebler is that Diebler will raise the standard of Ohio State basketball above where it was under Holtmann.
“It’s not gonna be the same. We have to take the standard up, and we tested him on that,” Bjork said. “We said, ‘Hey look, we’re not just happy with where we are. We want the standard to be at a high level.’ So it’s gonna get hard. It’s been different the last five weeks, but in order for us to win a championship and to pull that ladder out and get a pair of scissors out, the standard has to go up. Because that’s what you signed up for. That’s why you came here to be a Buckeye. This is only the beginning.”
