Mark WiedmerA University of Florida sophomore in September of 2001, Matt McCall was so determined to work in some capacity for the Gators that he dropped by athletic director Jeremy Foley’s office unannounced.
“His secretary was looking at me like I was nuts,” said McCall, the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga basketball coach, on Monday. “I’m pretty sure I wasn’t in any appointment book. I just sat there for an hour or so, waiting for an opening in his schedule.”
To be fair, McCall had known Foley for years as a family friend, thanks to his father, Wayne McCall, having been an outstanding linebacker for the Gators during Steve Spurrier’s playing time at UF in the 1960s.
But this was different. This wasn’t a sideline pass to the big game that McCall was hoping to land. This was a job, albeit a non-paying one.
“I think he was sympathetic to me because he’d started at the bottom in the Florida ticket office,” said McCall of Foley. “He literally was tearing tickets at games when he started.”