In this edition of Hawkeye Conversations, we catch up with one of the best point guards in Iowa history, Jeff Horner. We look back at his early commitment to Iowa, playing for Steve Alford, the high's and low's of his Iowa career, getting into coaching at a relatively young age, and his more recent battle with cancer.

Q: When did you kind of know basketball was going to be the sport for you?

HORNER: I’m going to be honest with you, probably when I was about four or five. I had older sisters who went on to play college basketball and my dad was a long time basketball coach. It was kind of just a given. My dad was a baseball and basketball coach too, so I played those sports too, but I would say basketball was my sport and I loved to play it.

Q: Was it hard for you to give up football because you were a good player.

HORNER: Yeah it was hard giving up both baseball and football, especially the summer of my senior year. Iowa has summer baseball and Coach Alford kind of “encouraged” me you could say to get to Iowa City and get with your teammates. That’s probably my biggest regret in my senior year, but football was hard to give up because I loved to hit people.

Q: When you were younger, Dean Oliver was playing for your dad. Did he kind of become your role model?

HORNER: He definitely did. He was my idol growing up. He and his dad were always in the gym and whenever I could tag along and try to learn I always tried to do that. Dean was good friends with my sister and his now wife was best friends with my sister, so he was always around the house too. Any time Dean would ask my dad to open the gym I was always there with him. I would watch practice and I was in awe of him. The biggest thing about Dean was how great of a person he was off the court too. I think the person he became is amazing and he’s a big role model.

Q: Was it the before your freshman year that you got the offer from Iowa or during it?

HORNER: Boy, that’s a long time ago now, right? (laugh)

I want to say that I believe it was the summer before going into my 9th grade year. Alford had just gotten the job and he came and watched me at a Future Stars Camp in the summer and I think he was looking at Rob Kampman too from Forest City. I made the trip down to Iowa City after that and he offered me and I pretty much committed on the spot.

Q: Do you ever wonder what a recruiting process would have been like for you if you hadn’t committed so early?

HORNER: Yeah, a little bit because I was still receiving letters from just about everyone in the country. It was interesting going into my senior year because J.J. Redick and I became pretty good friends on the AAU circuit and at the Nike Camp we were on the same team. He was like, you need to come to Duke and I think that was before Sean Dockery had committed there. It’s interesting to think about what could have been, but I’ve always been a Hawkeye in my life.

Q: What were your memories of AAU back in those days? Everyone I talk to always look back very fondly on those days because it’s kind of like this traveling brotherhood on the road all spring and summer with your teammates.

HORNER: I loved AAU. I had Brunner, Ben Jacobson from UNI (not the current coach), Nate Funk from Creighton, Josh Powell from Drake, and Mike Henderson was on the team as well. We had really good team and it was one of those things where we walk into a guy and everyone wonders who are these guys and they won’t be any good and then we take it to teams from New York and Chicago. Off the court we are still friends today. I will never forget our last event in Virginia Beach and we were all crying at the end because it was all over. We were great fiends and visited each other in college and played against each other in college as well. Those friendships will last forever.

Q: Did you and Brunner click from the beginning or did you kind of have to just become friends?

HORNER: I think I have told this story before. It was either sixth or seventh grade and he came over to my dad’s basketball camp and we were about the same size. I was big for my age and he kind of grew once he got into high school. He was playing point guard and I was playing point guard too and we would go at each other. I am not sure we liked each other that much at that age, but once we got on the same AAU team, it was a lifelong friendship.

Q: You grew up a Hawkeye fan, so when you are a kid, you are watching the Tom Davis era and Dean is playing there too. Then Steve Alford comes into your life. How do you make that adjustment and get to know him because you obviously knew Dr. Tom because he recruited Dean.

HORNER: It was one of those things where I went to the Iowa camp every summer as a kid. My dad worked the camp too under Coach Davis. I will never forget when I got my first letter from Coach Davis when I was in seventh grade and it was like the coolest thing ever.

After Coach Davis left and Coach Alford got the job it was one of those things where I liked him right away, but I was always a Hawkeye, so it didn’t really matter to me who the coach was. I just saw who he was recruiting and I got along with a lot of them well. I just loved Iowa City too. I did have time to get to know him since I was younger when I committed and I was really comfortable with him.

Q: It would have probably been very different if you were say a junior or a senior and he was the new coach. You had time to develop that relationship with Coach Alford.

HORNER: For sure. With me being a freshman and committing, you never want to go back on your word, but if something didn’t feel right you could. Every time I went to game at Iowa I got butterflies in my stomach and I couldn’t believe I would get to play here someday and the staff really made me feel at home too.

Q: You arrive on 2002 and it’s a different team. Reggie and Luke had moved on and maybe it wasn’t a reset of the team, but it was a different team at that point. What was it like that first summer and first year?

HORNER: Yeah, some things happened that year as well, so going into it all I knew was I was going to work hard and compete for minutes. I ended up starting the whole year and getting quite a few minutes and battling through a few injuries. A lot people don’t know, but I broke my foot that first year. I actually broke it in the Prime Time League and finally got it checked out at the end of the summer. I had to have surgery on it and gained some bad weight and really didn’t get a preseason going into my freshman year.

I had to get used to my teammates, especially as a point guard, so that first year with the injury in summer it made it tough. In the end we competed every night, even if we had only five or six guys that could play for us. It was an experience that helped us in our later years.

Q: It has to be much more challenging as a young point guard than any other position. Other guys can kind of fit in, but the point guard has to not only run the offense, but lead the team. As a freshman that had to be challenging.

HORNER: I think I kind of came in as a freshman and kind of tried to feel my way through all of it. You are a point guard, so you want to be a leader, but you also know you are still only a freshman. What I tried to do was lead by example and outwork people. I think that was what I hung my hat on was working hard. If people can see me diving on the floor and try to take charges, then I will earn respect from them. I think I did that and I think having previous relationships with some of those guys really helped too because I had played with Glen Worley and Jared Reiner and Sonderlieter in AAU too.

Q: If you had gotten dropped into Big Ten basketball from Mason City, IA, that’s a tougher transition. Did playing high level AAU really help ease that transition to big time college basketball?

HORNER: Going into my senior year I actually played with Collison and Henrich in the 19U AAU circuit, so I am playing with two guys going to Kansas who are probably going to be in the NBA eventually. Ok, I will be the spot up shooter on that team. I felt like once I got to my freshman year in college I had to do some of that too as kind of a pass first point guard. I have to make sure my teammates got the ball. I think AAU really helped me understand how to play with and against really good athletes. Nothing against basketball in Iowa, especially 4A, which is really good competition, but it’s a different level in AAU.

Q: Any memories of that first year where it was like, hey kid welcome to the Big Ten?

HORNER: (laugh) I can’t remember if it was my freshman year or not, but I got hit on a screen and I’m pretty sure I broke my nose. I think it was Graham Brown from Michigan who gave me a little screen from behind and I was down and bleeding. I was like, alright, this is college basketball now so let’s get some toilet paper in my nose and get back out there.

Q: You have mentioned the injuries you had in your college career. Do you have a laundry list of them, because I know there are more than people realize. Like the end of your senior year, you were hurting pretty bad going into the Big Ten Tournament.

HORNER: Yeah, for sure. Well, freshman year it was the broken foot and I have about a six in screw in my right pinky toe to this day, so that wasn’t fun. Then going into a game at Indiana, both Chauncey Leslie and I sprained our ankles bad the day before game. I could barely walk, but I think we were down to like six guys who could play at that point, so it wasn’t an option to not play. I ended having surgery on my left ankle after the season.

Then in my senior year, I hurt my knee in the UNI game. I had a partially torn PCL and had to wear that stupid brace. I still hate that to this day. I knocked my teeth out in an exhibition game against Wartburg. One of the bigger one’s was I had two broken ribs in the Big Ten Tournament my senior year. I did it right before the tournament, so lifting my right arm was interesting to say the least. You have to gut those things out because everyone has injuries. Luckily I could still get on the court, but I was probably never really healthy during the whole thing. I think probably only my sophomore year was the only year I was healthy and if you look at the numbers, that was probably my best year as far as stats. I would rather take the wins in my junior and senior year than the stats.

Q: Going back to your freshman year, you guys made the NIT and played at Iowa State. That was a particularly ugly game from a hostile fan perspective. Do you remember anything about that game?

HORNER: I didn’t even know this until the other day when my wife brought it up, I think my nephew was about eight at the time and he went to the game with my parents and they were walking up and bunch of Cyclone fans were yelling obscenities at them, so it started in the parking lot with my family. (laugh)

It was a physical game and it seemed like three or four guys were on the floor for every loose ball in that one. I remember hitting a three late in that game and that gave us the game. I think Brody Boyd hit a free throw late too. I think Jackson Vroman might have missed a second free throw as well. It was a crazy game, but getting a win there is always a dream come true.

Q: Your junior year you finally get the payoff. Everyone who plays college ball wants to make the tournament and you finally got there. What changed that year for your guys?

HORNER: I just felt like we were older and more experienced. I think at the midpoint of the year we were in first place or close to it when everything happened with Pierre Pierce. Then when you take a great player off your team, you have to fill that void and it took us a little bit to get it back.

We went into the Big Ten Tournament knowing what we had to do and we did that and I think that got us into the NCAA’s. In that tournament we got beat by a 30 footer, so that was heartbreaking. Then we sit there on Sunday and watch the selection show and waiting and then seeing we were playing Cincinnati. I was so excited at first and then I was like, this is not a good matchup for us. But, we would play anyone at any time. I think we just went into that year with the mindset that we were tired of playing in the NIT, so let’s get this thing going and get to the NCAA Tournament.

Q: You guys lost five of six when you were trying to get your footing back and then won the last three, including the win at Michigan. That had to be a big one, I would think.

HORNER: Yeah we won that one and we went right down to the wire with Michigan State in the second round of the Big Ten Tournament and that was a huge win. I was exhausted after that one and was kind of glad we were playing Wisconsin in the next game because they played slow. (laugh) I think Michigan State went to the Final Four that year and we were their last loss before they got there. I think that really served as a springboard for the following year.

Q: It is worth mentioning that you guys picked up a pretty good player that helped you in your junior year in Adam Haluska. When did you get wind that was happening?

HORNER: So, after our freshman year all of the sudden I got a call from a 712 number and back then we didn’t have fancy phone. I thought maybe it was Ben Jacobson (not the UNI coach) and he got a new number. I answer it and he’s like, “What’s up Horner?” I was like, “Hey how’s it going. Who is this?” He said it was Adam Haluska and he was thinking about transferring to Iowa. I thought it was joke and someone was messing with me. I was like, hey dude if we get you it’s going to be special here. Back in high school we were kind of rivals because I committed to Iowa early and he committed to Iowa State and I think he realized he needed to come to the good side. He and I are still best friends to this day. We go to visit him in Solon and bring our kids and they play together. The on the court stuff was great, but the friendship is more important to me.

Q: Senior year was pretty magical. What clicked that made everything go so well?

HORNER: I think we just had a bunch of smart players and the right guys were in there. We had Mike Henderson become the guy who could get to the basket and with Pierre gone we needed that. I thought he figured out his role. Adam was an excellent jump shooter and he had two guards that could really find him all the time. Then we had Bru in the post and he always got a good shot. I think with Bru, Adam, and myself, we had three guys who could really score and then Henderson as a defender and Hansen protecting the rim and I’ve still never played with a better shot blocker. We also had Doug Thomas off the bench along with Carlton Reed. It was great year and Tony Freeman came off the bench too. We really came together and I think it was maybe the first year we started and ended a season with the same team and that helped too.

Q: The run that year in the Big Ten Tournament where you won it was really special. You mentioned the broken ribs, but you played great in that tournament. What are the memories that really stick out from that run?

HORNER: I will never forget the day before we left for the tournament we had finished practice and thinking that’s it so let’s go. I even went and worked out again after practice to make sure I was ready and focused.

The first game against Minnesota was tough because they had already played a game in the building. Then we played Michigan State in the next one and that’s always tough. For me, I thought I had a pretty decent senior year individually and I felt like I got snubbed a little bit. I think Michigan State had two or three All Big Ten players and they finished 7th in the league. You think about those things and I felt like the best thing we could do is win the darn thing. Once we beat them we wanted Ohio State. We had beaten them in the regular season. We had a ton of respect for them and they were great guys, but we wanted to show the Big Ten that we should have won the title that year.

Everyone asks me about my favorite Iowa memory and I always say the Big Ten Tournament because you are going out on top in your senior year and everyone earned it.

Q: And Alex Thompson hits the shot of the ages in that title game.

HORNER: Exactly. I remember him coming off a ball screen and lifted up and both guys went with the roller and I was like alright here we go. He had to shoot this thing and holy cow, let’s go.

Q: I’ve been covering Iowa for a long time and two moments will always live with me. One was interviewing the Iowa football players after the Big Ten football title game in 2015 and the other is going into the locker room to interview you guys after the Northwestern State game. It still lives with me going into to talk to you and your teammates. I’m guessing it still lives with you too.

HORNER: Yep. Oh yeah. It was one of those things were you are on such a high coming off the Big Ten title and thinking, let’s see how far we can take this thing. I honestly feel like that team could have made a deep run. To this day it’s one of the most heartbreaking things in my life. I think about it every single day and the big thing for me is I feel like we let the Iowa fans down. I still have that feeling today and it’s kind of like my senior year in the state tournament in high school where we lost in the first round as the #2 seed. It’s hard to do those interviews, but you have to step up and do those things in a tough time and it builds character.

Q: During your Iowa career, I think it was in your senior year I wrote a column kind of pointing out that fans were making Iowa basketball all about Alford and missing out on not focusing on you, Bru, and a really good basketball team. Did that come into your world that everyone is against your head coach and did it bother you?

HORNER: It definitely did. I think sometimes people lump us in with coach and what they thought about him, they thought about us because we played for him. I always tried to strive to be the best person I could be and that’s not a knock on anyone else. There have been so many rumors about some much stuff and you try to stay away from that and just stay in the moment. I did my best to stay away from all the other stuff. I can tell you this, every guy that was on the team, we gave 100% and tried to win. I think there were a lot of good people on that team. It makes me sad that fans didn’t want to watch our games and be a part of us because of that. It was hard on us and you see that even today they still talk about Steve Alford. It like people can’t let go. He’s gone now and at Nevada and he’s been other places too. I get frustrated when people skip over our team as one of the better teams in a while just because they hated Steve Alford. It’s too bad that some of our accomplishments as a team get overshadowed and it’s tough for us.

Q: After you get done at Iowa, you took your shot at playing overseas and professionally in the states, but did you kind of just always know coaching was in your blood and that’s where you wanted to end up?

HORNER: My professional career was interesting to say the least. I was really upset because I had workouts with the Pistons and the Nuggets and then I did a workout down in the Orlando with a bunch of teams watching and then I didn’t get on a summer league team. I was kind of heartbroken. I think my agent was probably better at the overseas stuff than he was at the NBA stuff. I learned a lesson with that and went overseas and played in Belgium and that was a lot of fun. Brunner was only an hour away and that was a great having a friend over there with me.

The first year was great, but I didn’t fully appreciate it until later. I was kind of like, where’s McDonalds that type of thing while I was there because I was a picky eater. Now looking back it was an awesome experience. I was healthy my first year and had a great season. I signed to play in Paris the next year and found out the team really didn’t want me, so I go and play in the G-League. After one of the players got in trouble I took over as the starting point guard and then Haluska and Curtis Stinson join the team and we were winning games and I was playing well and Nick Nurse told me, come back one more year. He said he thought he could get me a 10 day contract and that sort of thing and the team in Belgium offered me a two year deal that was hard to turn down. Then I started having injuries again. I broke my foot twice again and sprained my ankle and had to have surgery on it and the left knee got hurt. I gave it one more try and I was just kind of sick of it and got cut and it was time to move on to coaching.

I am learning now that they tell you that you need eight years of coaching experience, so basically playing pro ball hurts you now, which is kind of strange. I was beat up and I just said it was time to hang it up. I thought about going into medical sales, but my mom told me that she didn’t think I would be happy if I wasn’t around basketball. Now here I am.

Q: You start up at the high school level at Valley. I guess that’s what dad did, right?

HORNER: A lot of people didn’t know this, but I was talking to Fran McCaffery because that was the year he got the Iowa job. He wanted me to come on as a GA, but I think Lickliter had gotten rid of the position, so he didn’t know what he could give me beyond a stipend and getting grad school paid for. He didn’t know what kind of money he could get me and my wife and I had been moving around quite a bit, so finally I just told Fran that I wanted to be in Des Moines. I got the chance to be a head coach at a young age and I was grateful for that. Fran was very good about it and he has helped me out in my career as well.

Q: Did you have a relationship with Fran before he came to Iowa?

HORNER: I didn’t. The funny part was one of the guys I played with overseas was Brian Lynch, who went to Villanova. Fran had recruited him when he was at Notre Dame, I think and I hit him up and see if he could get in touch with Fran and I did. Fran told me I was one of his favorite players and that was pretty cool. We still stay in touch today.

Q: You are at Valley and coach Peter Jok, but then you move on to North Dakota and get an opportunity at the college level on Brian Jones staff. That was an Iowa connection that helped you move up the ranks.

HORNER: Yeah, Brian had asked me a couple of times to come up there and be the basketball ops guy and you don’t make the best money in those jobs, but you are moving up the ladder. I loved my time up in Grand Forks. Both my kids were born there, so it’s a special place for us. We went to the NCAA Tournament there and won a Big Sky Tournament. I still think we should get that win back against Arizona after all the stuff that has come out. (laugh)

Q: How do you land at Truman State?

HORNER: After my first year at Valley, Matt Woodley was the coach here and asked me to the assistant at Truman. That was the time when Peter Jok said he was going to transfer to Valley, so I thought, we could have something special here and I couldn’t leave after one year.

I knew that they always had quite a few Iowa kids on their roster and felt like I could keep that tradition going there. I got an interview with the AD and we are keeping that Iowa connection going.

Q: What has it been like for you to be a head coach at the college level?

HORNER: It’s been tough. At North Dakota you are staying up until 3 am after a game getting work done or you are in at 6 am and not getting home until after 10 or you are out recruiting. It’s been a tough path, but the way I was raised in my family that’s the person I am keeping working at it. It also helps that my wife can work from home because all the jobs haven’t been great salaries. She has been really supportive.

Being a head coach now, you can kind of make your own schedule, which is a huge plus. (laugh) It’s been great and we have had some success so far.

Q: This last year has been a challenge for you. No one expects in their mid-30’s to hear the words, you have cancer. What has that been like for you and how have you battled in that journey?

HORNER: it was one of those things that happened out of nowhere. I went to the doctor and told it was nothing. Then I went recruiting in Omaha and wasn’t feeling well and went to the ER and was told something different. I finally got to the doctor again and he wanted to do an ultrasound and then you are told it’s testicular cancer and the following day I was having surgery.

It all happened so fast and I was kind of in shock. I really didn’t know what was happening. Then finding that I had more cancer in there after the surgery, that added to the chemo I was going to have to do. I found out I had to do five days in a row and that would last about five or six hours. It was tough on my family. My wife was a rockstar taking care of the kids and chemo knocks you on your butt too.

I think this year the experience I went through helped me calm down more on the bench and I think that helped our kids with their confidence. Basketball was secondary to me to my health and that was a message everyone told me, take care of yourself first. It has made me a better person and made me appreciate a lot of things more in life. I am really thankful to have it over with and I still think about it every day. I am fortunate that my kids weren’t old enough to understand everything that was going on during that time, but someday I can tell them this story.

Q: The good news is you are doing well.

HORNER: Yep, I have had two clean scans since my last chemo treatment. I have another scan coming up on June 25th and hopefully it will be clean. I am healthy now and starting to workout a little bit.

Q: When you have something like that happen you have people reaching out to help you. Were there meaningful conversations that happened that helped you?

HORNER: That was one of the biggest things for me. I am not a huge social media guy. I know it’s one of those things that you kind of have to have as a coach. In the end I told my wife that we are going to have say something because I was going to lose my hair and I feel like I have decent hair. (laugh) People would have been like, you have good hair, why shave your head? (laugh) I came out with statement on twitter and I can’t even tell you the number of people that reached out to me. Brunner came down and sat with me for a week with the chemo treatments. In the two weeks I had off chemo I went to an Iowa football game and got to see Haluska and Jack Brownlee and all those guys. Everyone really reached out and I will be forever thankful for that. I tried my best to get back to everyone and if I didn’t I just want to say thank you to everyone. The care that people showed to me is something I will never forget and I can never repay that. The day before I started treatment I went to Indianapolis to see JR Angle and his wife and I found out when I got there I found out they had raised $500 for us out of the kindness of their heart. I started crying and I don’t cry unless I lose sporting events, so that tells you something right there. Again, I can’t thank people enough for reaching out.

Q: Did Bru make fun of you for having a bald head because you used to give him a hard time about his lack of hair?

HORNER: (laugh) He definitely did. A good story about that I drove back and forth every day so I could see my kids because I thought it was important and it would help keep my spirits up. Bru and I went in one day and every day you have to tell the parking lot attendant where you were going. I was driving and I looked at the attendant and said, I have to take my friend up for chemo. (laugh) Bru started laugh and called me a few names. He got on me about having a bald head.

Q: I’m guessing that given Fran McCaffery’s involvement in cancer related things and having gone though it with Patrick that he reached out as well? Guessing Coach Alford reached out right away too?

HORNER: Yeah, Coach Alford was on the phone right away along with Fran. I reached out to Patrick as well since he had gone through treatments as well. Patrick and I had a couple of conversations about having cancer and what he went through. I am glad to see him getting healthier. Fran called. Coach Alford called, along with his dad. Greg Lansing called and Coach Jones. I was just blessed to have all of them call and offer support.