Canzano: Monday Mailbag focuses on Pac-2 money, coaching carousel, UW's AD fiasco, Bo Nix, and more
Your questions. My answers.
David Worlock will tell you that the NCAA Tournament is his job. In fact, the director of media coordination for March Madness declared over the weekend that he has the best job in the country.
Worlock grew up in Germany. He’s a self-described “military brat” who used the Armed Forces Network television and radio broadcasts to track the NCAA Tournament in the 1980s.
He told me on Monday: “I was regularly staying up in the middle of the night to watch and listen to games, just as I did for Super Bowls and other major sporting events.”
Worlock, now 54, rooted for Syracuse as a kid.
“Keith Smart broke my family’s heart,” he told me.
Worlock and his wife now live in the suburbs of Indianapolis. This week he finds himself immersed in the NCAA Tournament, working with media and statistics.
On Monday, the NCAA announced that the men’s tournament averaged 9 million viewers over the first four days, making it the most-watched tournament through that stage in the history of the event.
Also, Worlock told me the backstory of his wedding:
“When my wife and I were picking a wedding date, she threw out April 2 as a possibility. We were living in Arkansas at the time and it was the 1993-94 season. I told her I wasn’t getting married on Final Four Saturday and she was incredulous, saying ‘We're going to set our wedding date around some basketball tournament?!?’
“I said absolutely, especially since Arkansas would be a title contender and many of my friends wouldn't come to a wedding if the Razorbacks were playing in the Final Four. Little did I know then that: A) Arkansas would win the title; and B) Our life *actually* would largely revolve around ‘some basketball tournament.’”
The couple will be on a plane returning from the Final Four in Arizona on the date of their 30th anniversary. So here’s me wishing a happy early celebration to the Worlocks and the basketball-themed honeymoon that never ends.
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This week I got questions about the Pac-12’s rebuild, men’s and women’s NCAA Tournament units, the ACC drama, Washington’s AD fiasco, basketball coaching changes, Bo Nix’s NFL future, pizza, Dan Lanning, and a lot more.
Onto the Monday Mailbag…