Throughout the summer, Star columnist Greg Hansen is profiling 10 Tucsonans making a difference. Up today: Suzy Mason, the UA's do-it-all athletic administrator.
Because she was a baseball catcher growing up in Canandaigua, New York, Suzy Mason qualifies for any baseball term you want. Here鈥檚 the one that fits best: She is a five-tool player.
She helped to hire coaches.
She successfully operated a host site for the NCAA basketball tournament.
She engineered the security for a tense Territorial Cup game.
She wore a hard hat to work to supervise a $30 million makeover of McKale Center.
She coordinated a construction project for as many as 280 workers per day to build the $72 million Lowell-Stevens Football Facility.
People are also reading…
Mason鈥檚 title is a long one: senior associate athletic director for event management and facilities. She鈥檚 an Ivy League grad (Cornell) whose strength is her versatility; she works in the dust and dirt and also in a dress.
鈥淚鈥檓 a boots-on-the-ground kind of person,鈥 she says. 鈥淚t鈥檚 a fun dance.鈥
A week ago, Mason was in her windowless office at McKale, bouncing between four ongoing construction projects that will cost $66 million. She stopped briefly with associate Matt Brown to watch live webcams of the massive swimming, softball and football makeovers.
鈥淢att said, 鈥榃atch this guy on the Komatsu backloader. He鈥檚 unbelievable,鈥欌 she said. 鈥淎nd he鈥檚 right. I鈥檝e got so much respect for the skill it takes to run a backloader or an earthmover.鈥
Did you ever think you鈥檇 hear that from an associate athletic director at a Pac-12 school?
The renovation the McKale Memorial Center underway in 2014. The $30 million project was completed that fall.聽
A few years ago, Arizona athletic director Greg Byrne gave a tour of the bowels of a torn-up McKale Center. We walked into a dark corridor accompanied by sounds of power tools and hammers crashing against a wall.
Mason walked out of a dark space, hard hat in place, a purposeful expression on her face.
鈥淲e鈥檙e going to run the work crews in shifts until midnight,鈥 she told Byrne. 鈥淲e鈥檝e got to get finished on schedule.鈥
As Mason walked away, Byrne spoke the way he would speak when someone like Scooby Wright sacked a Sun Devil quarterback.
鈥淪uzy鈥檚 in control,鈥 he said. 鈥淚t is very comforting.鈥
In 20 years at Arizona, Mason has touched 鈥榚m all, another baseball term from her ballplaying days in Canandaigua. She has been involved with ticketing, security, fan engagement, concessions, lodging, TV replays, NCAA volleyball tournaments, NCAA softball super regionals, and accommodating a training camp for the Phoenix Suns.
That鈥檚 just a partial list. Once, when the ZonaZoo was at its most popular, she had to tell 600 students that they couldn鈥檛 get into Arizona Stadium. That being-the-bad-guy routine is not in any job description, especially for a people-person such as Mason.
鈥淥ne of her assets is the ability to tell you what you need to hear, not just what you want to hear,鈥 says the man who hired her, former UA athletic director Jim Livengood. 鈥淭hat alone is an art form.鈥
The UA's Suzy Mason is bouncing between four major protects, including a $25 million upgrade to Arizona Stadium.
Mason is married, a mother of two 鈥 鈥淚鈥檓 a softball mom,鈥 she says proudly 鈥 who says that 鈥渆very day is different.鈥
How in the world did a Cornell grad, a varsity basketball player, wind up at Arizona?
鈥淓very winter I鈥檇 watch basketball on TV and I鈥檇 see that old cactus-and-sunset logo on the court at McKale Center and it drew me to watch Lute Olson鈥檚 teams,鈥 she remembers. 鈥淎fter I graduated from Cornell, I moved to North Carolina to get a master鈥檚 degree. I never had a plan to move to Arizona.鈥
But she got to know a guy who knew a guy who knew the late Boyd Baker, a top functionary in the UA鈥檚 physical education operation. One thing led to another and Baker contacted UA assistant athletic director Dick Bartsch, and it wasn鈥檛 long before Mason drove to Tucson sight unseen.
She has gone from an intern to director of internal operations to a bunch of titles and responsibilities that reflect her ability to get things done.
This summer she is booked, dealing with project managers, demolition experts and work crews who are charged with completing a $25 million Arizona Stadium project by Aug. 31, and to stay on schedule to have an $8 million Hillenbrand Stadium re-do done by Feb. 1.
鈥淚t鈥檚 an ambitious schedule but it can be done; we can鈥檛 be late on these things,鈥 she says. 鈥淲e鈥檝e got our swimming team practicing at Amphi High School twice a day. We鈥檝e got 277 student-athletes taking summer classes. Our softball team will hold fall practice at Lincoln Park. We have to maximize every square-foot of property we have to make this work.鈥
Mason doesn鈥檛 get the easy stuff, like scheduling basketball games or staying in five-star hotels to oversee a football trip to Stanford or Colorado.
鈥淗er people skills and work ethic skills are over the top,鈥 says Livengood. 鈥淚鈥檝e been around a lot of great people during my career, but I鈥檓 not sure I鈥檝e ever been around anyone better or more task-oriented than Suzy.
鈥淗onestly, she could be the AD at any university in the country and they would immediately be better. The UA is so very lucky to have her.鈥
The old-school Mason grew up in a neighborhood where the summer games were Wiffle ball, kick the can, kickball, flashlight-tag and anything you could invent. 鈥淚鈥檇 stay out until dark,鈥 she says. 鈥淢y neighborhood was mostly boys so I had to learn how to speak up to keep up. I鈥檓 sure that鈥檚 where I got my leadership skills.鈥
As Arizona spends $66 million to maintain pace in the demanding Pac-12, Mason has developed friends foreign to most at big-time athletic departments: project managers, engineers, architects and Komatsu drivers.
鈥淚 love the challenge of this,鈥 she says. 鈥淚t lights my fire.鈥
Contact sports columnist Greg Hansen at 520-573-4362 or ghansen@tucson.com. On Twitter: @ghansen711
Greg Hansen
Columnist
