Fred Hoiberg replaces Tom Thibodeau as the Head Coach of the Chicago Bulls

Fred Hoiberg of Iowa State College at the press conference where he was hired by the Chicago Bulls.

Well that didn’t take long!

Less than a week after the Chicago Bulls fired 5 year Head Coach Tom Thibodeau, the franchise hired Iowa State Head Coach Fred Hoiberg as his replacement. On Tuesday, the long rumored pairing off the Bulls and Hoiberg become official, making the latter the 19th Head Coach in franchise history.

Hoiberg left his alma mater Iowa State College where he was paid 2.5 million dollars a year, to join the Bulls who are paying him double of that per year as part of 5 year 25 million dollar contract, league sources told Yahoo Sports. He led Iowa State to an overall record of 115-56 over four years which included four straight NCAA Tournament appearances and back to back Big 12 tournament titles.

Hoiberg joins Florida’s Billy Donovan who was appointed as Head Coach of Oklahoma City Thunder and Boston’s Brad Stevens as college Head Coaches making the leap to the NBA without any prior experience. He will be taking over a highly talented and versatile Bulls team, one that fell short of its expectations this season when they were eliminated by LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference Semifinals.

"I love this roster," Hoiberg said. "I love the versatility of the players, the different lineups that we're going to be able to play. You can play small, you can play big. You've got lineups that I think can really get out and play with pace. You've got a great group of veteran players that know how to play. I think Tom Thibodeau is an excellent, excellent basketball coach, and I think he instilled a lot of unbelievable qualities in this team that hopefully I can build on."

Hoiberg has a lot of talent at his disposal : A former MVP in Derrick Rose, An emerging player and first time All-Star in Jimmy Butler and aging Pau Gasol who is coming off one of his best seasons yet the question remains, can the Bulls make it past James? Four of the past six seasons, Chicago has been eliminated in the Playoffs by teams led by 4-time league MVP James. Answering questions related to that Hoiberg states:

"That's something that I don't think I can answer right now - how are we going to get by him?" Hoiberg said. "But as we study film throughout the summer and watch all the games, you have to try to beat the best, put a game plan together where you can accomplish that. That'll be a big focus of what we do this offseason, not only compete against him but compete against everybody."

With the past two Bulls Head Coaches (Vinny Del Negro and Thibodeau) fired over their relationship with the management, Gar Forman made sure everybody knew Hoiberg had the full support of the front office and ownership.

“We feel strongly we've got a guy with a skill package of a winning coach, a natural leader and great communicator,” Forman said. “We've known Fred for a long time, thought very highly of Fred. We have great respect for who he is as a person and the job he has done.“He was the right guy to maximize our talent. A big part of coaching is the human element — getting guys to buy in, to play together, to play hard, to accept roles. We have confidence that Fred’s going to be able to do that.”

“I’m very confident in my relationship with these guys,” Hoiberg said resonating the mutual trust that he and management share before they begin their journey together on the long path to make the Chicago Bulls NBA Champions.