Sad news came out of the Final Four, as Illinois State associate head coach Torrey Ward died early Tuesday in a plane crash while returning from the Championship game. All seven people on board died when the private plane crashed.
“Both men were well-respected and much loved colleagues in our athletics department,” university president Larry Dietz said. “I join with the Redbird athletics family and the entire campus in mourning the loss of these two men and the others aboard. Our thoughts and prayers are with their families.”
“My daughter’s husband and [five] other men and the pilot went to the NCAA game last night and they were flying back and I guess the weather was bad in central Illinois. It was foggy,” Scott Barrows, a former UIC faculty member, told the paper. “They were supposed to land around midnight. My daughter was called at 4 a.m. There was no contact. It has been confirmed they are dead.”
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