- Slug: BC-CNS-CN2Go Weekly Update. Runtime 14:25.
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THIS IS YOUR CRONKITE NEWS 2GO BRIEFING.
(Bring up music briefly and duck below and out )
I’M KENNY RASMUSSEN…
HEADLINE 1 – PHOENIX CORGI
Arlo, a Phoenix corgi, qualified for the finals of the Corgi Winter Nationals
HOST: RAMBUNCTIOUS CORGIS PUT THEIR PAWS TO WORK AT THE CORGI WINTER NATIONALS IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA! A HUNDRED CORGIS RACED FOR THE OPPORTUNITY TO BECOME THE TOP DOG AT THIS ANNUAL RACE…
CRONKITE NEWS’ AYANA [A-YAH-NUH] HAMILTON WAS THERE TO FOLLOW AN UNDERDOG FROM PHOENIX.
**(Open with sound of race announcer)**
HAMILTON: A flurry of furry stubby legs galloped down the grassy race track barking at others in their way with the hopes of being the champion of the Corgi Winter Nationals.
**(Actuality of race announcer)**
HAMILTON: A hundred corgis raced for the opportunity to become the top dog at this annual race. A corgi named Arlo from Phoenix came a long way to compete at this PAW-pular event in Santa Anita Park. His owner, Lu Dagda, was delighted when Arlo qualified for the semifinals.
DAGDA: “How we prepared just hanging out, doing all of Arlo’s favorite things so he could just have a fun time. We’re having a great time, and he’s a winner in our hearts just by participating.”
**(Corgi’s racing down the track)**
HAMILTON: These fluffy racers came in different colors and sizes. One older corgi named Luna Tuna beat the odds and also qualified for the semifinals… Her owner, Cece Hunter, was ecstatic when she crossed the finish line.
HUNTER: “She’s definitely one of the older ones. She’s eight, so she almost to the senior race. And she’s one of the bigger girls, but us big girls stick together. We are so excited. Big Track! Here we come!”
HAMILTON: As the races continued, some corgis were antsy and couldn’t wait to hit the turf!
**(Corgi whines and barks)**
HAMILTON: While waiting for his race to start, Killer the Corgi’s owner Mohamed used the opportunity to network with other owners.
MOHAMED: “It’s just, you know, some fun for me and him. I work a lot, and I, you know, get an opportunity for the weekends to hang out with him. So I look forward to it.”
HAMILTON: Moving onto the semifinals, the corgis who qualified moved to the horse race track to compete against the reigning champion, Emmett.
**(Corgi semi-finals race audio)**
HAMILTON: After the semifinals concluded, many owners gathered around to see if their corgi made it. Luna Tuna was one of the finalists. Hunter was very proud…
HUNTER: “Can you believe it?!? … We are so excited. She’s never made it to the last race. She made it to the semi-last race like this before, but we’re excited. Go pink! Number 8!”
HAMILTON: At first, Dagda wasn’t sure if Arlo qualified because the race happened so fast. But an instant replay showed Arlo being the fourth one crossing the finish line, qualifying for the finals.
DAGDA: We don’t feel not not surprised, but we are pleasantly surprised that he made it to the finals. We never thought we’d be here from Phoenix doing that.
HAMILTON: The final race was dog-gone exciting! Arlo and Luna Tuna raced their hearts out but couldn’t beat the champion corgi, Emmet… When asked how to train a winner, owner Jessica Taylor says happiness is the key.
TAYLOR: “He won winter nationals last year, and he won another corgi nationals race, and he won Bolt Up Corgi Cup at the Chargers, so he got to run at SoFi Stadium!”
HAMILTON: Underdogs Arlo and Luna Tuna placed ninth and 10th but will always be champions in their owner’s eyes.
**(Music)**
Ayana Hamilton… Cronkite News… Los Angeles …
**(Music)**
HEADLINE 2 – DARREN WOODSON
Maryvale native Darren Woodson looks back on a career with the Sun Devils and Dallas Cowboys
HOST: MARYVALE HIGH SCHOOL STANDOUT AND ASU SUN DEVIL DARREN WOODSON HAS BEEN NAMED A SEMIFINALLIST FOR THE NFL HALL OF FAME FOR THE PAST FIVE YEARS… THIS YEAR. HE BROKE THROUGH AS A FINALIST…
SPENCER CIHAK TAKES US THROUGH HIS AMAZING FOOTBALL JOURNEY AND TELLS US WHETHER HE MADE IT INTO FOOTBALL’S TOP CLASS…
CIHAK: Darren Woodson was born as the youngest of four and moved to Maryvale, Arizona, when he was 8… and from a young age he was always on the move.
LUKE: He was always active, always been a quiet kid. He was called the “quiet giant” when he was in elementary school because he was taller than most of his schoolmates, but, you know, just didn’t have much a whole lot to say.
CIHAK: That’s his mother, Freddie Luke… The “quiet giant” was determined from a young age to play football. Here is woodson himself…
<<WOODSON: They used to put weights in my pants to make the weight, because I wanted to play when I was 7.>>
CIHAK: At that time Maryvale was home to four future NFL players – Darren Woodson, Phillippi Sparks, Kevin Galbreath and Kevin Miniefield… growing up in the projects young men learned life lessons quickly…
WOODSON: We’re all from single moms, tough, tough, single moms, that raised us in a way to be polite, and be respectful and whatnot. And be scared of them… I’m still afraid of my mom to this day. So they poured into us, too, man at young ages, and it kept us off the streets.
CIHAK: Woodson attended Maryvale High School with Sparks and Galbreath and at 15 attended an ASU football summer camp where they met ASU recruiting coordinator Don Bocchi
BOCCHI: The first day I saw him move around at camp, I knew that we would be recruiting Darren Woodson. He just was, I thought, a spectacular athlete.
CIHAK: Woodson’s talent on the football field gave him confidence off the field, too. His friend and teammate, Phillippi Sparks, explains…
SPARKS: Darren’s nickname in high school was Billy Dee Williams, because he’s good-looking, smooth, always smiling, Mr. Beautiful Body you know, so … he always had a job in the summers and stuff like that. Darren was always taking care of business.
CIHAK: But while Woodson’s skills on the field where worthy of a Division 1 scholarship, his skills in the classroom fell short. Bocchi remembers meeting Woodson at Maryvale High School.
BOCCHI: I remember I met him outside the cafeteria, and I looked at the transcript, then I looked at him… I looked at the transcript, and then I looked at him… He said, coach, he says, is something wrong? And I said, Darren, there’s not much right on this transcript. And I was shocked… I said, Darren, there are very few grades here above a C. And there are a lot of grades below C. And he wasn’t that kind of young man. So it became evident that he would not be capable or able to predict, and accept, an N-C-double-A scholarship…
WOODSON: I can’t blame my teachers at Maryvale High, I can’t blame my family members. I had all the resources in the world, I just didn’t apply myself.
CIHAK: Sparks had similar academic issues his senior year and explains where they fell short.
SPARKS: Here we are kids in high school just, la la la la, just going to school and doing our thing and not knowing about what we were supposed to do with our academic advisers of getting, you know, a well-rounded education or trying to move on to progress your career in athletics and school.
CIHAK: Woodson had only two choices out of high school: He could have spent two years at a junior college and earn his associate’s degree before transferring, or spend his first year at ASU as a fulltime student only. Woodson chose to attend ASU and did not play football for the first time in his young life.
WOODSON: It was very frustrating. I did a lot of crying man, I cried a lot.
CIHAK: Without a scholarship Woodson had to pay his own way. His mother, Freddie Luke, knew what she had to do.
LUKE: “Okay, let’s go borrow some money.” So that’s what I did. It just took off from there.
CIHAK: For Woodson, how he thought others would see him drove him toward success.
WOODSON: People on the outside who didn’t know me, just looked at me as, “Well, he’s a dumb football player, he can’t get his grades, right” and that’s… the pride is what I had to overcome. But the only way to get over that embarrassment was to say, “I’m going to show you that I can do this.” And not only that, but I’m going to do it in three-and-a-half, four years and move on…
CIHAK: Don Bocchi believes that moment changed Woodson’s life.
BOCCHI: Because he decided in the moment I will be the best Darren Woodson I can be, not just the best football player I can be.
CIHAK: In the fall of 1988, Woodson was academically eligible to accept an NCAA scholarship. ASU teammate Kelvin Fisher remembers Woodson’s presence on the team surprised many.
FISHER: I don’t think a lot of guys on the team knew that he was on our team, that he was just going to school. So a lot of guys was like, man, where did he come from, who is that?
CIHAK: After his first week, there was great debate among coaches about where to play Woodson.
BOCCHI: The linebacker coach wanted him, the secondary coach wanted him, the outside linebacker coach wanted him. The running backs coach said he would like to have him. I was coaching the wide receivers and I just threw it in there to say, “I’ll take him, too.So I mean, we needed seven or eight Darren Woodsons at the time.
CIHAK: Woodson became a defensive back for the Sun Devils. In his senior year, Woodson was elected team captain, along with Kelvin Fisher.
BOCCHI: He was so well-respected. Both of them were. And they were no-nonsense kind of people. They did their work, played hard. You know wanted the best for their teammates in the program.
CIHAK: Fisher explains their captain dynamic…
FISHER: It was almost like good cop, bad cop… Darren was kind of like the laid-back type, but he could pull the guy to the side and talk to him and say, “Hey, you know, this is what we’re trying to do,” whereas I was the guy that was like, “Hey, man, this is what we’re going to do.” That was kind of the difference. So we were, I always felt like we had a great balance.
CIHAK: In April 1992, Darren Woodson was selected by the Dallas Cowboys as the 37th overall pick in the NFL draft. His mother, Freddie Luke, broke the news to him
LUKE: That day, he says, mother, I cannot stay at home and wait on a phone call. And I said, I understand that. So he gets up and went to his girlfriend’s house at the time to just kind of keep his mind off of what was going on… When the phone call did come in, I was shocked… I got him on the phone, I says you need to come home mow, because you have a flight you have to catch in about an hour, almost two hours. And he says, “Why?” I said because the Cowboys want you. And he, wow, couldn’t believe it.
CIHAK: Woodson went on to play for the Cowboys for his entire 12 year professional career. But first he had to get his diploma that May. Don Bocchi explains what the moment was like for the student that couldn’t get his grades right
BOCCHI: He told me, when he graduated, he said, “Coach, my dream was always to get drafted into the NFL. He said in April, I got drafted into the NFL. He said, the feeling I had was, was tremendous. He said, ” But it wasn’t even close to how I felt when I walked across the stage, accepted the diploma from Arizona State and then handed it to my mother.” It gives me goosebumps today.
CIHAK: Woodson became an integral part of the Cowboys from the moment he arrived playing on special teams and in third-down situations before becoming a starting safety his second year. His former teammate Dale Hellestrae talked about how unique the start to his NFL career was.
HELLESTRAE: He got drafted, I mean, his first four years in the league, we won the Super Bowl. We won the Super Bowl, NFC Championship game, won Super Bowl. Heck of a way to start your career.
CIHAK: Woodson went on to being named a captain of the Cowboys and finished his career as the all-time leading tackler in Cowboys’ history. He won his second Super Bowl title in Tempe against the Pittsburgh Steelers at Sun Devil Stadium. It was a very important moment for Woodson to celebrate those that helped him reach that point
WOODSON: I know I gave up about 25 Super Bowl tickets, because I have so many teachers that poured in to me that I was gonna give tickets to, family and friends. And to win that game in front of all them and just to celebrate, not just to celebrate the win, but just to celebrate life with them after that game was really important to me.
CIHAK: After six years of being named an NFL Hall of Fame semifinalist and breaking through to become a finalist this year, Woodson was not selected for the 2023 class. Woodson is a member of the ASU Hall of Fame and the Dallas Cowboys Ring of Honor. He believes he deserves to be in the NFL Hall of Fame at some point
WOODSON: I feel like I’m deserving to be in the Hall of Fame. I think I played at a high level. I have championship rings. I have all pros and I deserve… I feel like my name should be called at some point. Look. it’s a process and I totally understand the process and I respect the process.
CIHAK: For Woodson, it’s more about being a representative of the defense that helped Dallas win those championships and those that helped him get to the NFL.
WOODSON: I feel like I’m one of those guys who led this team for a long time that should have that opportunity as well to represent but those that defense in the 90s
CIHAK: For Don Bocchi, he believes Woodson is deserving not just because of Woodson’s skill, but because of the type of person he is.
BOCCHI: Some players just play well. Some, some players play well enough and elevate the people around him. He was that kind of player, but never the kind of player that pounded his chest and had it be about him. Never.
CIHAK: The type of player any team would want.
In Tempe… Spencer Cihak… Cronkite Sports…
HOST: DARREN WOODSON LIVES IN THE DALLAS AREA AND IS A SUCCESSFUL BUSINESS OWNER OF A REAL ESTATE AND SOFTWARE COMPANY …
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WE HAD HELP TODAY FROM AYANA HAMILTON AND SPENCER CIHAK…
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YOU CAN LEARN MORE ABOUT THE STORIES YOU HEARD IN TODAY’S NEWS UPDATE, BY GOING TO CRONKITENEWS-DOT-AZPBS-DOT-ORG.
THAT’S ALL FOR YOUR CRONKITE NEWS 2 GO. I’M KENNY RASMUSSEN.
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