Aaron Katsuma remembers the moment Richard Pitino gave him his first job in college basketball.
At a late-season road game against Nebraska, the fourth-year, senior team manager at Minnesota was approached by the first-year Golden Gophers head coach at the team meal in the hotel.
“He asked me to come back the next year as a GA (graduate assistant),” said Katsuma, who has worked on the staff at Colorado State for the past five years. “… I think I was able to earn his trust. And after my two years as a GA – I completed it and got my master’s – then he went to the (athletic director) and said we have to do anything to keep Aaron around.