This week, with the frenzy of media attention on Troy Basketball, the college basketball world discovered head coach Scott Cross and his basketball team’s love for Waffle House. 

A clip of Cross explaining the way he uses Waffle House in recruiting went viral via social media, spreading all across multiple national media outlets, as well. The way Cross uses the restaurant as a part of recruiting started with the very first two players he brought on campus to recruit when arriving at Troy. 

“We’re driving down (Highway 231), I point out Waffle House, and ask him if they want to eat there for breakfast,” Cross told On3.com. “They were like ‘Waffle House? Hell nah, I don’t want to go to Waffle House.’ I’m like, ‘Okay, my bad. We’ll try to eat somewhere else.’ Long story short, we signed neither one of those guys.”

“Then we brought a guy, Nick Stampley, who’s an ‘OKG,’ Our Kind of Guy, he was our third recruit. We’re driving by and we don’t even say anything about Waffle House. He sees it and is like, ‘Oh Coach, Y’all got a Waffle House here? Can we go there tomorrow?’. He was our first signee and one of the toughest guys we ever coached.”

It ended up becoming a trend where players that did like Waffle House were the ones Troy ended up signing.

“(Stampley) was one of the toughest guys we’ve ever coached,” Cross said. “And from that point forward, we just kind of off-hand asked (recruits), ‘Do you like Waffle House?’ If the answer is ‘yes,’ we sign them. If it’s ‘no,’ we never get them. So I told my staff, ‘Hey, y’all can save a lot of time and money, first phone conversation ask them in passing do they like Waffle House or not.’”

On Tuesday, Cross further spoke about Waffle House with the local media and explained how the Waffle House fits the personality of his team and that mindset could play into an upset on Friday. 

“You can’t be bougie if you’re going to be here at Troy, you have to be an ‘OKG,’ that’s what makes Troy good and our team special,” Cross said. “We’re guys that dive onto the floor and do the dirty work, we’ll take the stairs. That’s our only chance you have at this game (against Kentucky). If you’re a ‘pretty boy’ and think you’re going to out offense Kentucky, that’s not going to happen. We have to do all the little things and all the gritty and grimy things and it still won’t be an easy task.” 

Cross, his family and his team spend practically every birthday at the Waffle House in Troy.

“Just about every birthday we’ve had, we’ve celebrated there this year,” Cross said with a smile. “They decorate for us, they put up ‘Happy Birthday’ and the whole nine yards.”

Cross event spent his own birthday there.

“We were on the road watching my youngest boys play at Charles Henderson on my birthday and the next day I was in the office working late,” he recalled. “My wife texts me and says we need to eat so for me to come meet her at the Waffle House. About 15 minutes later she’s like, ‘You need to come over here. You’re not supposed to know this but your whole team is waiting here for you to celebrate at Waffle House. So, act excited.’”

Cross said that his players have probably been there 30-50 times this year and it’s also a place for celebration after wins for the Cross family.

“There’s been many home games we win where that’s where we’ll go starting back to last year,” said Cross. “The people there are awesome people, every one of our guys loves Waffle House.”