Two mayors stopped by Carver Hall Thursday morning — one a busy gubernatorial candidate and the other a professional basketball player with some time on his hands.

Tom Vilsack, the Democratic hopeful for governor, received the endorsement of Fred Hoiberg, Iowa State alumnus and Indiana Pacer, at the early morning press conference.

Vilsack is the former mayor of Mount Pleasant, and Hoiberg was nicknamed “The Mayor” during his career as a Cyclone basketball standout.

“His views on education are the key points that really sit well with me,” said Hoiberg, who would have played Sunday in an National Basketball Association exhibition at Hilton Coliseum had a strike not wiped out the league’s preseason games.

Both Hoiberg’s parents are teachers, and he said Vilsack’s proposal to limit elementary-level class sizes to 17 students is key to improving the state’s educational system.

“Tom Vilsack stands for everything that I believe will move Iowa into the next millennium,” Hoiberg said.

Gesturing to his wife and daughter standing beside him, Hoiberg said he is looking forward to living in Iowa after he finishes his basketball career.

“I want to come back to Iowa,” he said. “In order to propel Iowa into being a state where people want to stay here, we need to elect Tom Vilsack.”

Education also was the theme of Vilsack’s time at the podium.

“Each of you is struggling with the cost of higher education,” he said to about 20 students gathered in the Carver Hall lobby.

He blamed Wednesday’s 4.5 percent tuition increase on a state government that did not fully fund the three regents universities this fiscal year.

“You can invest sufficient resources [in the schools] that the Board of Regents doesn’t have to look at tuition increases,” he said.

Vilsack mentioned two other measures to cut the cost of education.

He said the state should forgive $5,000 in tuition, books and board for Iowa-educated teachers who stay in the state to teach. He also would forgive the loans of workers making less than $7 per hour who go back to school and get a higher-paying job.

Those in attendance directed a wide variety of questions at Vilsack.

A query about Vilsack’s draft status seemed to catch him by surprise, and he mumbled a few words and seemed to hesitate before answering. He said that his draft number as a student at Hamilton College was 127, but only men with numbers 1-125 were drafted for Vietnam.

One student asked the candidate’s opinion on President Bill Clinton’s dalliance with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky.

“There is no excuse for what President Clinton did, and I’m not going to try to apologize for it,” Vilsack said. But he insisted that the president’s humanitarian work in the United States and abroad more than makes up for his failings in his personal life.

Joel Ehlers, sophomore in agricultural business, was not impressed.

“I’m afraid that he’s got some traces of Clinton running through him,” he said.

Ehlers said he voted by absentee ballot for Vilsack’s opponent, Republican Jim Ross Lightfoot, because of Lightfoot’s “moral assets.”

Another student voiced his support for Vilsack.

“I’m open to views on both sides, but I’ve seen what Lightfoot has done and I don’t think that’s right for our state’s future,” said Evan Heggen, junior in pre-construction engineering.