Wildcat sports desk gets around

From the University of Arizona's 1988 Final Four berth to this year's football clash at Penn State, the Arizona Daily Wildcat was there.

The Wildcat's presence at big events, regardless where they've been played, has been as typical as the cheerleaders at center court or band members on the field.

Chris Jackson, who covered the football team's 41-7 loss at Penn State in August, says, "I think other people look back at their college days and you ask them what they got to do and the best thing they can tell you is that they once did a keg stand for 40 seconds."

The earliest known trip was made by Bill Greer in 1965. Greer, now a UA journalism professor, went to Salt Lake City to report on the football team's 19-9 win over Utah. He flew with the team and went to three or four away football games over his Daily Wildcat career.

"Going on trips was just a blast,'' Greer says of the expensed ventures. "There were big parties every night. Not with the team, but all the media people would have big parties. I just kind of sneaked in with them."

Since then, assorted datelines from football and basketball games have appeared, especially since the university joined the Pacific 10 Conference in 1978.

"It doesn't cost that much to send a reporter to UCLA to cover a game, or even to the Bay Area," says Mark Woodhams, director of student media.

During the 1998-99 school year, $4,500 was allocated for sports travel, he adds.

"As long as there's the advertising budget to support it, we'll always send reporters out," Woodhams says.

John Moredich trekked around the United States with the 1988 men's basketball team. Arlie Rahn covered the 1997 national champion hoops team. Tourney stops during the championship run were in Memphis, Tenn., Birmingham, Ala., and Indianapolis.

Monty Phan attended Super Bowl XXX in Phoenix. And, most recently, Jackson witnessed the drubbing at Penn State.

"I was happy to go anywhere," Phan says. "I got to go to the Super Bowl - and for free. To me, that was pretty cool"

As a junior, Moredich covered the 1988 basketball team, which advanced to the NCAA Final Four. Arizona's tournament games were played in Los Angeles, Seattle and Kansas City, Mo. He made every regular season game with the exception of contests played in Alaska and Flagstaff.

"I don't know how I got to do all that,'' Moredich says. "It gave me great clips. They sent me to different parts of the country that I'd never been to before and places I will never go again probably."

The trips were nothing like a vacation, though.

Moredich, who now covers UA sports for Cat Tracks, a local weekly publication, wrote seven stories after the team's loss to Oklahoma in the national semifinals.

"I'd say our coverage was equal or better than anyone at (The Arizona Daily) Star or (Tucson) Citizen," says Moredich, who worked at the Wildcat for 3 1/2 years. "(Coach) Lute (Olson) wrote me a letter praising my coverage that year. He said I had more insightful information than anybody covering the team at that time.."

Wildcat writers have not have the luxury afforded to beat writers at daily newspapers, either. Instead of the current practice of e-mailing stories to the desk, Wildcat reporters mostly fax handwritten articles to their editors. Occasionally they'll borrow a laptop.

"I was just praying my spelling was correct and my writing readable," says Rahn, now a systems and software engineer at Honeywell in Phoenix. "Looking back, it's pretty funny. After the national championship win, I had Dan Patrick from Sports Center calling scores in next to me and here I am scribbling on a notepad."

Rahn, who worked at the Wildcat for nearly four years, covered the basketball team in 1997. In addition to the tourney, Rahn went to regular season games in Los Angeles and Anaheim, Calif.

Phan was instrumental in getting the Wildcat access to the 1996 Super Bowl at Sun Devil Stadium.

"I knew the State Press (ASU's daily) had gotten a pass and it really (made me mad)," says Phan, who made three trips while covering the 1994 basketball team. "I didn't want them to be there and not us, so I wrote the NFL and kind of embellished on our amount of Cardinals coverage. We had done a couple features.

"When the credential came in the mail, I was just amazed," he says.

Phan, now a general entertainment reporter at the Arizona Republic, called the experience "surreal."

"Covering the Super Bowl showed me the amount of work you really don't have to do," says Phan, who was given a seat with other reporters in the stands. "You could show up five minutes before the game ended and be fine because they give you endless quote sheets and summaries of every play."

Jackson, who went to the Holiday Bowl in San Diego last December, plans to attend UA's football game at UCLA. He'll go to a bowl game if the Wildcats qualify.

"I've said it before: This is the best job on campus," Jackson says. "We actually get paid to travel with teams like these."