President Barack Obama visited Kansas University this morning to visit with KU students and several Lawrence residents on the heels of this week’s State of the Union address.
Obama, a huge and well-known college basketball fan, opened his speech at Anschutz Sports Pavilion by talking a little KU basketball.
He said he met with KU coach Bill Self and the men’s basketball team just before taking the stage and added that he figured he might as well talk to some basketball players since he was in Lawrence already and everything.
Several Jayhawks instantly took to Twitter to share their thoughts about meeting the president and Obama, himself, kicked off his speech with talk about KU being back on top of the Big 12 Conference race and praised Self’s streak of 10 straight Big 12 titles.
It was an honor meeting President @BarackObama this morning and listening to him speak… He’s the real #1 lol pic.twitter.com/jRtdCDAJQs
— Wayne Selden Jr. (@WayneSeldenJr) January 22, 2015
Known by many as a gifted and charismatic speaker, Obama then made a correlation between one of his streaks and KU’s streak of Big 12 titles.
“Coach Self has won 10 straight, I lost two straight (in Kansas),” he said, referring to losing the state of Kansas in the general election during both of his presidential campaigns. “I might have won some sections of Lawrence. That might have happened.”
Obama’s love for KU hoops came as no surprise and it made sense for him to kick off the day’s festivities talking about the one thing that unites this town better than anything else.
Our own Gary Bedore talked with Self briefly after the speech and the KU coach told him that the team met with Obama in Hadl Auditorium and presented him with a personalized jersey and KU basketball.
Just finished coolin’ with Obama. ????
— Brannen Greene (@b_greene14) January 22, 2015
Just met Obama #KU
— Cliff Alexander (@CAlexander) January 22, 2015
