March Madness has a special feeling for the Horodyski family.

Tonight at 7:35 p.m. on truTV, No. 15 seed Queens University of Charlotte, which is making its first NCAA Division-I tournament appearance in program history, will play No. 2 seed and Big Ten Tournament champion Purdue in the West Region at the Enterprise Center in Saint Louis, Missouri.

Queens won the Atlantic Sun Conference championship in Jacksonville on Sunday, March 8.

Behind senior Chris Ashby’s 34 points (10-for-19 on 3-pointers), the No. 3 seed Royals defeated top seed Central Arkansas, 98-93, in overtime, in the championship game to punch their ticket to “The Big Dance.”

Robert “Bob” Horodyski, who was the head coach of the Buchholz boys basketball team for 27 years from 1993 to 2019, was there to watch his oldest son, Bobby, cut down the nets.

“Huge fan of Queens,” Bob Horodyski said. “I met the head coach, Grant Leonard, years ago. He was an assistant for Jimmy Link at Paine College in Augusta. Jimmy played for me at Buchholz. Grant was instrumental in recruiting Jonathan to Queens, where he played for four years, and they won 119 games. Every year, they made the postseason.”

Bobby, who played for his dad at Buchholz from 2007 to 2009, is an assistant coach for Queens.

“I couldn’t be prouder of Bobby,” said Bob Horodyski, who won over 400 games at Buchholz, including “five or six” district titles and played in “three or four” regional finals. “He has a great work ethic and an outstanding basketball mind. He will be a great head coach when he gets that opportunity, but he is even a better father and person. He genuinely cares for all the people around him. It was pretty emotional for me to watch him cut down the nets.”

That “work” ethic is also a labor of love at times, but it includes a lot of travel and 70-hour work weeks this time of year.

“I don’t work, I love what I do,” said Bobby, who was a graduate assistant with Larry Shyatt at Wyoming and also joined the staff at BYU as the Director of Basketball Operations as part of his coaching tree. “When you do what you love, it’s not really work. I have the privilege to come to the university every day and serve and give back to the next generation through the sport of which I love that my dad instilled…by the time the NCAA Tournament is over I’m going to be over 40 nights not slept in my own bed, whether we’re on the road recruiting, whether we’re on the road playing a game.”

The Horodyski family got to enjoy the special championship moment together, including Bobby’s wife and 18-month-old son.

Bob’s youngest son, Jonathan, was also there, along with Bobby and Jonathan’s mom, MaryBeth Horodyski, and Zach Schmidt, a high school teammate of Bobby’s who won a district championship together at Buchholz and on a Bobcats team that went all the way to the regional final in 2009.

Jonathan also played for Queens (2017 to 2020) when the Royals competed at the Division-II level and was a part of an NCAA Final Four, an Elite 8 and a Sweet 16.

“It was incredible to watch,” said Jonathan, who is currently the president of their collective and in charge of Queen’s NIL. “During my time at Queens, our team had the opportunity to cut down the nets twice in the conference tournament. Getting to see Bobby and this team cut down the nets for the first time at the Division-I level was a thrilling moment. I know the amount of work, discipline, and adversity that goes into something like that, so to see it pay off and now getting to see them play on the biggest stage in college basketball is really special, not just for them, but for everyone connected to the program.”

But it all started many years ago in Gainesville.

“Buchholz has a special place in my heart,” said Bobby Horodyski, who moved to Gainesville shortly before his third birthday and met his wife in student government at Buchholz. “Absolutely love Gainesville. I literally grew up in Gainesville, so that’s home to me.”

Jonathan played for his dad from 2012 to 2016.

“So many great memories of coaching Bobby and Jonathan,” Bob Horodyski said. “They were two of the most unselfish players I ever coached. My assistant, Blake Golden, who did most of the subbing, would have to threaten to take them out because they would not shoot the ball enough.”

Two memories came to Bob’s mind about their high school careers.

The first was the second round of the regional playoffs when Bobby’s team was in the second round at Spruce Creek (Port Orange).

“Spruce Creek had a 300+ pound wing who was pretty good,” Bob Horodyski said. “With under a minute to go up one, Bobby took a charge on that player. You couldn’t see him under the pile. We went on to win it by three and lost to Austin Rivers and Winter Park in the region finals. After the loss, (coach) Doc Rivers came up to me to say hello, and I asked him if he would say a few words to the team after the loss. Doc went in and saw Jonathan sitting on a bench crying, and Doc said, ‘who is that?’ I said, ‘my youngest son, Jonathan.’ Doc said ‘I love it.’”

A memory of Jonathan was the district championship game against Fletcher (Neptune Beach).

“Our best player, Bryan Chalifoux, was ejected for hanging on the rim in the first half,” Bob said. “At halftime, I said to Jonathan, who did not score in the first half, that he needed to get selfish and take the game over and start scoring. He scored 18 points in the second half and hit six straight free throws down the stretch to seal the district championship. I recall you gave him the player of the game.”

Jonathan said some of his best experiences in Gainesville and at Buchholz stemmed from the “strong sense of community and family.”

“With my father serving as the head coach at Buchholz throughout my childhood, I had a unique vantage point to observe the success and culture he built over the years,” he said. “Watching my brother play for him added another layer of significance. In 2016, I had the opportunity to join the program myself, playing for my father alongside teammates I had grown up and competed with since elementary and middle school. Those years taught me lessons about hard work, accountability, and teamwork that I still lean on every day.”

As far as the game tonight, Bob said he booked the flights and hotel five minutes after it was announced.

“Obviously, being a 15-seed, it is going to be a difficult game,” he said. “Purdue’s size inside is going to be a problem. Purdue has a history of losing in the first round as a high seed, so not sure if that history helps or hurts. Queens is going to have to shoot well from deep and needs to make 15-20 3’s to have a chance.”

Queens may be a Cinderella team, but Bobby is totally fine with that.

“I guess at the end of the day, all you want is a seat at the table, a chip and a chair,” he said. “Give us a poker chip, give us a chair to sit in, and let us go play our hand, let our guys go fight, claw, and scrap, and give it everything they have to represent our city, our university, our athletic department, our team, their family, and at the end of the day our guys are going to give it everything. I love our team and I love our guys and if we can get shots to fall, we’ll have a chance.”