This needs to start with an example, something every Millennial Iowa State fan can reference back to and as such it will start with a good reference point. In the movie (500) Days of Summer, a film about a man who falls in love with the IDEA of a woman, more so rather than the woman herself, there is (spoilers ahead for an almost ten-year-old movie) a breakup scene involving Tom (the man) and Summer (the titular idea). During the discussion of the two splitting, Summer describes herself as Sid Vicious and Tom as the woman Sid stabs seven times. The whole thing is sort of depressing and leaves Tom in a very down in the dumps state as he walks out of the diner and hears summer say, "you’re still my best friend." Yikes.





O.K. Now that the reference point is out of the way, time to get to the nitty-gritty of this whole thing. Yes, Fred Hoiberg is at Nebraska, and yeah, that is in a way sort of sucky and really stings and probably more so than it would a normal fan base; after all, Iowa State fans are accustomed to being hit with bee stings. (The Wallace pylon jump, the field goal against Alabama, almost ANY time John Higgins has a whistle.) But this one felt different, this one felt personal.





Coming out of the Greg McDermott era, things were in a little bit of shambles for Iowa State basketball, which admittedly was an improvement coming out of the Wayne Morgan era. (Honestly, there’s probably a deep dive on what a pivotal moment Wayne weirdly represented but now isn’t a time for that diatribe.) It was as if we as a fan base had spent a few years post-college being consistently drunk and stumbling looking for something to guide us out of the mess we had found ourselves in.





In enters a dreamy-haired, blonde-eyed local legend. A man with a mythos that echoed not just in the minds of those who had seen him play before but also to those who had heard the tales of his greatness. Much like Summer, we had in our minds what exactly Fred represented to the fan base and not so much to the totality of what could happen down the road. See, we all thought that this was a match made in heaven, a marriage of two people bound by the Bells of Iowa State it would seem, but such is life some times in how it fools us.





Sure some of the moments were good (Christopherson kissing the floor, Royce dunking during the first UCONN game), some were great, (Naz’s game-winners against OSU, Hogue’s herculean performance against UCONN) and others were the exact opposite, (losing to UAB, Niang’s foot injury). Yet, through it all, Cyclone fans, and we held in our heads this idea of what "could be" with Fred and what the future could hold with him at the helm.





Then sometime around midnight, the clock struck, the dream ended, and the whispers began. The murmors about his disdain for recruiting grew louder and louder like a freight train steaming down on a crossing. The stories started that he wanted more, that the relationship wasn’t as Disney-esq as we were lead to believe. Supposedly, Pollard and he didn't see eye to eye on the image of the school, and Fred wanted more. Something more high profile. Something bigger.





So led us to that scene in (500) Days of summer. The brutal break-up. The metaphorical knifing of Fred to the fan base. His departure, though brutal and heartbreaking at the time was almost expected at the point it happened. We had always in a way known that it likely wasn’t meant to be forever. It was a brief fling that got the program back on its feet and standing tall again. Something that helped rescue the fan base from itself and put it back in a place where it needed to be at the time.





Which now brings us to Fred signing with Nebraska, a former vaunted rival. It’s almost like your "wrong place wrong time" ex suddenly dating your fraternity brother whom you despised for his spoiled and entitled attitude. But looking at it like that in a vacuum isn’t fair to where the fan base and program are now. Sure the feelings are complicated and ultimately there’s probably a sting that comes with it, but the right view at the end of the day is "who cares?"





Prohm is the type of guy you marry. He’s the lifetime, concrete and building block character that will invest his love and care into something bigger than his own image. Not to discount what Fred did for Cyclone fans and their relationships with the program, but (to borrow a quote), "viewing everything through rose-colored glasses makes all the red flags just look like flags." All along there was this idea he wouldn’t try to elevate himself beyond just Ame, but in the back of the mind, we always knew that wasn’t the case. Prohm doesn’t have those same questions. He’s the type of guy who truly wants success for the program and relationship as a whole and not just to elevate himself.





All in all, it’s O.K. to look fondly upon what once was with Fred. That’s just a natural and human way to digest. But the idea that we’re missing out because Fred has moved on elsewhere doesn’t mean we need to safeguard those feelings and think "oh well, why can’t that be us?" Clearly, things weren’t right in Ames or he wouldn’t have left, it’s sort of just that simple. Fred will always be special for what he did and what he represented at the time.





Fred is Summer. Prohm is Autumn. And we can only love what we have, not what could have been.

Follow me at -- @ryanMStives