UNIVERSITY PARK, Texas — Deep inside the annals of Moody Coliseum, in a seldom visited hallway lined with molded pipes and adorned with a flickering exit sign, four concession stand workers sit in a makeshift circle.
Each of them faces one another under the hazy fluorescent light – some pressed against a wall of empty refrigerators and others flung out uncomfortably on a myriad of week-old fruit boxes and unused generators.
The dim hallway takes on the aspect of a campfire as each worker begins sharing why they are about to serve 1,500 people at an SMU basketball game in the middle of a pandemic, which has only tightened its grip on Dallas in recent weeks.