March Madness may be over, but the same cannot be said for the school spirit of Hoya Blue president Kurt Muhlbauer (COL ’07). Since coming to Georgetown, Muhlbauer has been intimately involved in every aspect of Hoyas athletics, from organizing road trips to basketball away games to flyering campus for soccer and volleyball games. The Sag Harbor, N.Y., native discusses Georgetown sports, the road to the Final Four and Jeff Green and Roy Hibbert’s NBA prospects.

How did you become involved with Hoya Blue?

Basically, before I got to school, I was interested in school spirit, sports and all that stuff. I heard about Hoya Blue and thought that that was something I wanted to be a part of. Freshman year I applied for a position on the board. I didn’t actually get on the board my freshman year, but they told me to hang around. I was pretty persistent in continuing to do stuff even though I didn’t get a position. I went to all the events, tried to do as much as I could to be involved.

Then sophomore year, they kind of took me on as basketball chair, so I had to come up with ways to promote basketball. It was coming off my freshman year when we had the worst basketball season we’d had in 30 years, so we did a lot of stuff to try to be creative.

My junior year I was elected president. There’s kind of been a big change in Hoya Blue since I’ve been president. We’ve tried to include as many sports as we can – before that, athletically there were a lot of sports that we ignored. I sort of overhauled the entire board.

What kinds of events do you try to plan to rev up school spirit?

Everything from barbeques to pre-game type stuff. We try to get people to dress up for team volleyball games; not that many people even know that we have a varsity women’s volleyball team. We basically just try to get people to go to games. We’ve really been good with the soccer team. We try to be more organized in general for sports that people might normally not go to besides basketball. We try to support the other [Georgetown] teams.

We’ve been pretty successful. We’re a lot better now. We’re doing a lot more now. More freshmen want to get involved every year, so we’re growing.

What have been some of your best memories?

There’s been a lot of great stuff. Some of the best personal memories are just going on road trips. We organized road trips for [some of] the away games for basketball. Those are always just incredible times. You meet some great people, ride on the bus with everybody, stay in a hotel with everybody. Just the feeling of being there supporting the team is great, especially this year seeing the team play so well.

What was it like going to the Final Four this year?

It was amazing. We were at all the games from the Big East tournament to the playoffs leading up to it, so it was just great seeing that 50,000-seat set-up and all the hype surrounding it and all the hard work that went into it from four years ago. We ended up falling a little bit short, but we had such a wonderful year. I’m just so grateful for the experience.

Do you plan to keep hardcore following and supporting the Hoyas after you graduate?

I’m in it for the long haul. I plan to stay in the area, not only for the team, but also just for my friends. I just want to keep supporting the team, keep going to the games. I definitely want to be here.

What sort of changes did you make to the Hoya Blue board?

The board is president, [vice president] and treasurer, the three positions we have to have by SAC. Then we added events chair, promotions officer, communications director, who lets everyone know what’s going on through e-mails, and personnel. Basically these are all volunteers.

How do you feel about Jeff Green and Roy Hibbert declaring for the draft?

Well, I knew that they were probably going to put their names in. Everyone does who has a chance – even [Brandon] Bowman did it [in 2004] just because he had a chance. I feel they had to at least put their names in.

I think we have to support them no matter what they do. If you were in that kind of position, you would probably do it, too. I hope they come back [because then] our team will be incredible next year, and it would just be wonderful to see them back. I think the Georgetown community just needs to support them, whatever the decision.

– Interview by Sarah Mellott

March Madness may be over, but the same cannot be said for the school spirit of Hoya Blue president Kurt Muhlbauer (COL ’07). Since coming to Georgetown, Muhlbauer has been intimately involved in every aspect of Hoyas athletics, from organizing road trips to basketball away games to flyering campus for soccer and volleyball games. The Sag Harbor, N.Y., native discusses Georgetown sports, the road to the Final Four and Jeff Green and Roy Hibbert’s NBA prospects.

How did you become involved with Hoya Blue?

Basically, before I got to school, I was interested in school spirit, sports and all that stuff. I heard about Hoya Blue and thought that that was something I wanted to be a part of. Freshman year I applied for a position on the board. I didn’t actually get on the board my freshman year, but they told me to hang around. I was pretty persistent in continuing to do stuff even though I didn’t get a position. I went to all the events, tried to do as much as I could to be involved.

Then sophomore year, they kind of took me on as basketball chair, so I had to come up with ways to promote basketball. It was coming off my freshman year when we had the worst basketball season we’d had in 30 years, so we did a lot of stuff to try to be creative.

My junior year I was elected president. There’s kind of been a big change in Hoya Blue since I’ve been president. We’ve tried to include as many sports as we can – before that, athletically there were a lot of sports that we ignored. I sort of overhauled the entire board.

What kinds of events do you try to plan to rev up school spirit?

Everything from barbeques to pre-game type stuff. We try to get people to dress up for team volleyball games; not that many people even know that we have a varsity women’s volleyball team. We basically just try to get people to go to games. We’ve really been good with the soccer team. We try to be more organized in general for sports that people might normally not go to besides basketball. We try to support the other [Georgetown] teams.

We’ve been pretty successful. We’re a lot better now. We’re doing a lot more now. More freshmen want to get involved every year, so we’re growing.

What have been some of your best memories?

There’s been a lot of great stuff. Some of the best personal memories are just going on road trips. We organized road trips for [some of] the away games for basketball. Those are always just incredible times. You meet some great people, ride on the bus with everybody, stay in a hotel with everybody. Just the feeling of being there supporting the team is great, especially this year seeing the team play so well.

What was it like going to the Final Four this year?

It was amazing. We were at all the games from the Big East tournament to the playoffs leading up to it, so it was just great seeing that 50,000-seat set-up and all the hype surrounding it and all the hard work that went into it from four years ago. We ended up falling a little bit short, but we had such a wonderful year. I’m just so grateful for the experience.

Do you plan to keep hardcore following and supporting the Hoyas after you graduate?

I’m in it for the long haul. I plan to stay in the area, not only for the team, but also just for my friends. I just want to keep supporting the team, keep going to the games. I definitely want to be here.

What sort of changes did you make to the Hoya Blue board?

The board is president, [vice president] and treasurer, the three positions we have to have by SAC. Then we added events chair, promotions officer, communications director, who lets everyone know what’s going on through e-mails, and personnel. Basically these are all volunteers.

How do you feel about Jeff Green and Roy Hibbert declaring for the draft?

Well, I knew that they were probably going to put their names in. Everyone does who has a chance – even [Brandon] Bowman did it [in 2004] just because he had a chance. I feel they had to at least put their names in.

I think we have to support them no matter what they do. If you were in that kind of position, you would probably do it, too. I hope they come back [because then] our team will be incredible next year, and it would just be wonderful to see them back. I think the Georgetown community just needs to support them, whatever the decision.

– Interview by Sarah Mellott