5/15/26: Mo Egger with UC Men's Basketball Assistant Coach Johnny Hill

The UC Men's Basketball Assistant Coach joined Mo as part of his 513 Day broadcast at UC.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Sitting down next to Johnny Hill, who is part of
Jared Calhoun's staff with the men's basketball program here at
U See, I feel I mean I feel old most days.
I feel really old when I'm sitting next to assistant
coaches who not only do I remember playing, but it
feels like you just got done playing it. Purdue.

Speaker 2 (00:17):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, man, I wish I could say
the same. My knees feel like I'm about forty five
years old. And so Coach Calhoun, he have us every
once in a while hopping these reads rells, So I
gotta I gotta stretch and make sure that I'm in
shape for that.

Speaker 1 (00:31):
So yeah, well, welcome to Cincinnati.

Speaker 3 (00:34):
Thank you.

Speaker 1 (00:35):
What made you want to come here?

Speaker 3 (00:37):
You know what?

Speaker 2 (00:38):
Just obviously our time at Utah State with Coach Calhoun
again familiar with him. That's just somebody for me that
and my profession I really look up to. He's a
guy that I think is very confident in himself. And
you can just kind of tell with you know, having
some success and bringing this entire staff with him, he

(00:59):
got some stuff that I definitely want to continue to.

Speaker 3 (01:02):
Get better at and just really excited about it.

Speaker 2 (01:05):
And then you know when this job kind of became
a possibility looking at the rich history of Cincinnati and
obviously playing Arizona in the Big Twelve. You see the competition,
Uh that this that this league breeds year in the
year out.

Speaker 3 (01:20):
So it's just a very exciting.

Speaker 1 (01:22):
And you have a chance to see Arizona up close tournament.

Speaker 3 (01:25):
Yep, up close in person. Yeah, yeah, I know it's
gonna be fun.

Speaker 1 (01:30):
Yeah, you correct me if I'm wrong. You had been
in logan with coach Calhoun for a year, So what
what drew you to want to go work for him
in the first place?

Speaker 3 (01:38):
Yeah, so great question. I was.

Speaker 2 (01:40):
I was actually there before with Danny Sprinkle in twenty
twenty three twenty four.

Speaker 3 (01:46):
We had a lot of success.

Speaker 2 (01:47):
We won the league, and then after that we kind
of went our separate way. So I did a year
at the University of Illinois Chicago back home, and then
opening came up on coach Calhoun's staff, and during his
interview process with that job, and you toss state me
and him and got familiar with each other. Funny enough,
I played Actually I did an FCA tour. I went

(02:10):
to China and Mongolia with his best player from Fairmont state.
Oh wow, And so me and coach Calhoun kind of
had a connection. He actually, Joe Mizzoula came to a
training camp and Coach Calhoun came to a training camp.
And I remember this kid, Thomas Wimbush. He was at
a school that none of us had kind of heard of.
It was myself, some teammates from Baylor and just different

(02:30):
schools from across the country. By the time we left,
every single one of us trying to recruit his player
to come to our school.

Speaker 1 (02:35):
So what's interesting? And I'll say this to you. So
Jared Calhoun was here and did you know, five six
minutes with me. And when he was done, he says, well,
who else do you have? And I said, we have
Johnny Hill and he goes, Man, everything Matt Painter says
about him is right now. So like you played for
Matt Painter, you joined that program the year after we
beat Purdue in the tournament. You weren't there for that,

(02:56):
So I can't taunt you too bad, like what did?
Matt Painter is a terrific coach obviously apparently speaks very
highly of you. Would you like about playing for him?

Speaker 2 (03:04):
Just a great human? You know, to start with very
He's a hard guy not to like. You know, It's
funny me and coach Calhoun is actually talking about him
this morning. He's just a guy when you get to
know him, just very real, very authentic, and just the
basketball savants.

Speaker 3 (03:19):
So he actually has a lot of qualities.

Speaker 2 (03:21):
That kind of remind the Calhoun kind of remind me
of him in certain ways, just his relationship with players.

Speaker 1 (03:27):
You'll get all these players on campus here in a
few weeks, and then when you do, you'll be better
equipped to answer this. But I'll ask you now, what
do you think the strengths of your team, which you're
still putting together, is going to be this coming season.

Speaker 3 (03:38):
Yeah, another good question.

Speaker 2 (03:40):
I think we were very intentional this time around in
a transfer portal, especially. I think we had a kind
of an advantage playing against Arizona, who was the champions
of this league, and seeing kind of some of the
threats that they pose to us, and so the one
thing that we were very conscious about was getting posditional size.

(04:01):
And so I think that's one thing on paper that
doesn't really change. Guys don't shrink in the course of
a couple months. So I think for us, we love
our size. We love our versatility at the wing position.
Got a really good point guard in Tyler Riley. Got
another good point guard in Elijah Perryman that we brought over
from Utah State with us. So I'm just really excited

(04:22):
about all the pieces and how they're gonna fit together.

Speaker 1 (04:24):
What have you become? What have you gotten to know
about the school, the city? And it's still just been
a few weeks. What have you gotten to know about
your new home?

Speaker 2 (04:32):
Yeah, just like I said before, the history of it
and the excitement around the program, Like is you go
anywhere on campus with Coach Calhoun and their students stopping
him to get pictures, you can tell that this school
is very excited about the direction that we're going in.
And outside of that, I haven't had too much time.
I got a wife and a daughter. We haven't spent

(04:54):
too much time, but I did take her to a
nice food spot, and so I really enjoyed a food.
We got a lot of those, A lot of those,
A lot of those. Man, So it's been it's been
great for so far.

Speaker 1 (05:06):
Well, welcome, best of luck. I told you off air,
you'll talk to no bigger Bearcat fan than me. Yea,
you know when when you guys get this back on track,
it's it's gonna be awesome. I can't wait.

Speaker 3 (05:17):
Yep, we're going to do it.

Speaker 1 (05:18):
Coach me so much.

Speaker 3 (05:19):
Yep, thanks a lot more.

Speaker 1 (05:20):
Johnny Hill part of Jared Calhoun's staff here at the
University of Cincinnati, the men's basketball program. It's fourteen away
from six o'clock. You see for five to one, three
day on ESPN fifteen thirty Cincinnati Sports Station,