Dylan Allen | ‘Are you a center?’

I still remember my first interview for a class at Cal Poly. I’ve tried to forget it, but I can’t.

December of my freshman year, I chose to write a story on Cal Poly’s recent transfers to their basketball program.

The final buzzer sounded, and I walked over to the entrance of the locker room to wait for the player I wanted to interview. The 7’1” Brian Penn-Johnson came strolling up. 

I asked him for a few moments of his time, and he agreed. My first question was: “Are you a center?”

Now, I know what you’re thinking: That’s not even a bad question. Yeah, I didn’t think so either at the time. 

For starters, his position is listed on GoPoly, a site I became all too familiar with over three years working for Mustang News.

Second, he is 7’1”. Really, dude? Is he a center? Let’s think for a second. He’s not a point guard. Granted, he doesn’t have to be a center, especially in today’s positionless basketball landscape, but I digress.

When I listen back to it, it’s hard not to cringe. But in the same flip of the coin, I realize how much I’ve learned since coming to Cal Poly. One major lesson: be prepared, which includes figuring out the position of the player you’re talking to.

In finding the Voice Memo, I had to scroll through more than 70 others, some from interviews labeled accordingly for Mustang News and others labeled “Voiceover” as part of a script for a class.

Each one reminds me of how far I’ve come since asking Brian what position he plays. 

I’ve travelled to Las Vegas, Corvallis and Irvine to cover Cal Poly sports. I’ve spent hours on the phone talking to sources. I interviewed the Swim and Dive team after their team was cut, and watched one source break down in tears trying to get through their interview. I watched my story, and a few others, get published as the front cover in print. 

I’ve done more than I ever thought I could when I joined Mustang News; feature stories, video packages, social media coverage and live broadcasting. I’ve produced stories I’m extremely proud of — and will likely make their way onto a shelf in my future home — but they are not what I’ll remember about this organization. 

When I stopped playing baseball my senior year of high school, I felt empty. I really didn’t have anything to look forward to and I had literally no idea what I wanted to do with a journalism degree. 

I added Cal Poly to my list of Cal State applications on a whim, and I randomly clicked journalism because I thought it’d be cool. I found Mustang News at the end of my freshman year, having no idea the profound impact and purpose it would give me three years later. 

It’s given me coworkers I call my best friends. It’s given me stories I’ll hold onto for the rest of my life. And it’s helped refine a natural curiosity about the world — which I’ve had since I was a little kid — into a real passion.

It’s given me moments I still look back on with a smile on my face. Between driving to cover a game in Santa Barbara, leaving Baggett Stadium freezing and unable to feel my hands at 9:30 p.m. or waiting for a postgame interview, the conversations, laughs and people I met will be what I remember most when I leave. 

Thank you, Mustang News. And thanks, Brian, I won’t ask if you’re a center again.