After more than two decades refereeing Division I basketball games, Mike Roberts finally earned his profession’s ultimate reward.

Each spring is a new adventure for the NCAA travel staff, who are charged with moving not only 20,000 Division I men’s and women’s basketball players, coaches, staff, band members and cheerleaders throughout the country, but also competitors and coaches for the other NCAA spring championships.

I grew up in Ohio, and I wanted to go away to school. I thought basketball was a good avenue for me to do that. I was recruited for three sports, but I went with basketball because of the opportunity to get a full scholarship.

Basketball shoes are generally made up of rubber, leather and synthetic materials. While brothers Ikenna and Osinachi Smart were growing up in Nigeria, they might as well have been made of gold.

In January, representatives of every NCAA division will gather to vote on the same Association-wide issue — adding five public members to the NCAA Board of Governors.