Moser was named the new head coach of the Ramblers on Wednesday, April 5, after serving under SLU head coach Rick Majerus for four years, three as associate head coach.
He was given a five-year contract at Loyola for an undisclosed amount.
“The last few days have been a whirlwind,” Moser said in an exit-interview with The Unviersity News. “I was so invested at Saint Louis. I started the same day Coach Majerus started, and from that moment, we started building. We started raising the talent on the roster and the strength of the scheduling. They are going to be very good. I love those guys and will miss them.
“But [Loyola] is a perfect fit for me. I wanted to be a head coach again, and to do it at a Jesuit school was the perfect opportunity. I played at a Jesuit school, coached at a Jesuit school. Chicago is my hometown. The Horizon League is up-and-coming, and the facilities [at Loyola] are new and fantastic.”
Moser previously was the head coach at Illinois State from 2003-07. In his four seasons, the Redbirds went 51-67 overall, 22-50 in the Missouri Valley and had one winning season. He had three years remaining on his contract when he was bought out by Illinois State following the 2006-07 season.
Moser was also the head coach at Arkansas-Little Rock from 2000-03. His teams went 54-34 overall and had three winning seasons.
At SLU, Moser was diretly responsible for the recruitment of freshmen Mike McCall and Dwayne Evans. Majerus relied on Moser to arrange the schedule for the team, as well.
Moser also served as head coach when Majerus was unable to. Following a leg injury to Majerus during the Jan. 1 game against Bowling Green Moser coached the Billikens for four games. SLU went 0-4.
“This is a great opportunity for Porter, and he’ll do a good job there,” Majerus said. “He should be able to have Loyola dominate. I’ll miss Porter. I worked well with him, and I wish him all the luck in the world.”
Majerus said he will hire a replacement, though he has no timeline for that process. In the meantime, assistant coaches Al Jensen and Chris Harriman will take over recruiting, scheduling and team workouts. Majerus does not expect Moser’s departure to affect recruiting.
SLU athletic director Chris May also had words of well-wishing for the former Billiken coach.
“Porter did a great job here,” May said. “He was a great assistant coach and assisted the university and the athletic program one-hundred percent. I’m thrilled for him and his family that he got his shot to go be a head coach again.”
At Loyola, Moser said he anticipates running a system similar to Majerus’. Among the qualities he will demand from his players are basketball intelligence, discipline and effort.
“Coach [Majerus] and I agreed on a lot of things,” Moser said. “We will run the up-tempo ball screens, man-to-man defense, but I will probably changes things up a little more with the zone and trap defense.
“I learned a lot from my time under Majerus. He’s definitely a master of the game.”
Moser understands that he is leaving a program currently in the rebuilding process just to start the motions all over again in Chicago. He said he hopes to temper expectations long enough to build a program for the university.
“We had a long-term vision [at SLU] about developing players and a program,” he said. “With the climate of athletics, everyone wants to win right now, and people get in a hurry. That leads to mistakes of rushing players.”
Loyola-Chicago will open at Illinois, and Moser said that he hopes to have a conversation with SLU “down the road” about facing-off against his former team.
