Koch Arena Tour

Since I have covered Wichita State sports for so long, last week's tour of Koch Arena led by Larry Rankin was nothing new for me. I saw the same stuff I see every time I go to the arena for a basketball and listened to much of what I already knew.

In that aspect, I didn't take much new information away from what Rankin had to say. I have picked his brain before about his job and media relations has always been something that I have considered as a possible secondary job. I always thought it would be cool to travel with the team, have exclusive inside access and put out cool online media guides.

In the past, Rankin has always been first-class and up-front with what he is telling you. I have always respected him for that and I think Wichita State has a very strong staff with Rankin, Tami Cutler and the graduate assistants. I thought it was interesting to learn the steps you needed to take to become a grad assistant, which is to volunteer to help. It seems like an easy start, but it is a lot of hard work also.

The first part of the tour was enjoyable to sit through and watch, even if I had already heard much of it. The second part of the tour, however, was a bit more, well, boring. The sports marketing thing just never intrigued me and after waiting for a long time, I was more entertained with achieving my high score in BrickBreaker than paying too close of attention.

All in all, it was a productive trip to Koch Arena, but it was not a memorable one. It will get lost in the shuffle over more interesting ones, like CatchIt Kansas or The Wichita Eagle trips.