College Sports Information Directors of America

Related Content
• 2023 Special Awards Announcements and Features
• #CSCUnite23 Convention Home
• CSC Hall of Fame

---

Marc Dellins – UCLA, Director of Executive Relations and Senior Associate Athletics Director - Sports Information Director (retired)

CSC Hall of Fame Class of 2023

by Tim Tessalone – CSC Special Awards Committee member/ USC Sports Information Director (retired)

(A year ago, Marc Dellins received a CoSIDA Lifetime Achievement Award and I was privileged to write a profile on him for the CSC website. With his election into the CSC Hall of Fame just a year later in 2023, the profile has been updated to include his thoughts on his newest honor.)
 
When 2023 CSC Hall of Fame inductee Marc Dellins retired from fulltime service at UCLA in 2013, I was asked to speak at his retirement celebration. It was a rare time that a Trojan gushed about a Bruin.
 
This is another of those times.
 
You see, for as much as our schools are fierce crosstown rivals—two of the nation’s most successful Division I athletic powers, located less than 10 miles apart in the nation’s second largest media market and producers of oodles of national championships, Olympic medalists and famous alumni—Marc was not my rival. He is one of my closest friends in the business. He was a confidant and a mentor.
 
 
We commiserated together whenever one of our schools was going through a problem and we congratulated each other on our schools' successes. But most important to me, Marc and his staff kept me and my staff on our toes. I always had an eye on Westwood to see what Marc was doing, how he was handling things, what new publicity method he was undertaking...and I knew we had to keep up.
 
Marc’s reputation and professionalism were second to none. His loyalty to, and passion for, all things UCLA were unshakable.
 
After all, UCLA is all Marc knew in his nearly 50-year career. 
 
The UCLA graduate interned in the sports information office starting as a freshman in 1972 under CSC (CoSIDA) Hall of Famer Vic Kelley (and how cool - Marc now joins his first boss as the two Bruins in the Hall!).  Kelley was inducted into the Hall of Fame the summer before Dellins arrived on the UCLA campus.
 
Soon after, he began his professional career in 1976 as an assistant SID there. He was promoted to senior associate athletic director/sports information in 1984, a role he held for 27 years before becoming UCLA Athletics’ director of executive relations in 2011 for two years until retiring. For the following seven years on a part-time basis, he helped the Bruins with football and basketball scheduling and TV contracts and served as a resource on UCLA’s athletic history.
 
Dellins admits he is humbled by his election into the CSC Hall of Fame.
 
“It is truly an honor when I think of my mentors and Pac-12 colleagues who are in the Hall of Fame and now to be thought of in the same way as them,” Dellins noted. “When I was young in the business and meeting SIDs like Roger Valdiserri and Don Bryant and people of that stature, never did I envision that one day I would be included with them.
 
“And it is very special to be joining Vic Kelley in the Hall. He got me started in the business and taught me everything I needed to know, especially the importance of building relationships with the media.”
 
The Hall of Fame induction will be Dellins’ third honor from CSC. As mentioned, he received a Lifetime Achievement Award at last June’s convention in Las Vegas. He also received a 25-Year Award in 2003. Additionally, Dellins was inducted into the Southern California Jewish Sports Hall of Fame in 2004.
 
During his UCLA tenure, Dellins smoothly and successfully guided the publicity efforts of some of the nation's best athletes, coaches, administrators and teams. Marc publicized such UCLA athletic luminaries as John Wooden, Terry Donahue, Ann Meyers, Bill Walton and Troy Aikman (to name just a couple of the thousands). 
 
“Interacting with Coach Wooden was special,” Dellins said. “He represented everything great about UCLA.”
 
His 35-year relationship with Wooden began during Marc’s student days. When Wooden announced after the Bruins’ 1975 NCAA semifinal overtime victory over Louisville his impending retirement, he let Marc — then the Daily Bruin co-sports editor — come to his hotel room for an exclusive interview.
 
“Imagine this nothing student journalist getting to listen to Coach Wooden talk about basketball and his decision to retire!,” Dellins marveled.
 
Two nights later, UCLA defeated Kentucky for the Wizard of Westwood’s 10th NCAA crown.
 
Years later, Dellins was growing a beard when he ran into the long-retired coach, who forbade hirsute players. Wooden needled Dellins he could never play for him with that beard.
 
“Coach, there are a number of reasons I could never play for you,” Dellins replied, “and a little facial hair isn’t one of them.”
 
Dellins said the hardest thing he had to do as an SID was announcing Wooden’s passing in 2010. 
 
“I kept my emotions in check until I got in my car that night and then I just lost it,” he said.
 
While Marc worked on campus, the Bruin men and women won 91 NCAA team championships.  Perhaps the most memorable for Dellins came in 2007 when UCLA became the first school to win 100 NCAA championships, thanks to its women’s water polo team.
 
“It was a privilege to work at my alma mater,” said Dellins. “The best part was working with the student-athletes, watching them come in as freshmen, helping them get through their time and mature, and seeing them achieve greatness on and off the field.  Our job was to set them up for their futures.
 
“I also enjoyed seeing former players return to continue their education, like when Aikman received his degree 20 years later, completing a promise he made to his mother.
 
“I was blessed to work with great people at UCLA, including a great staff. They didn’t work for me; we worked together. I never asked them to do anything I wouldn’t do.”
 
When he retired in 2013, longtime Southern California News Group columnist Mark Whicker wrote “(Dellins’) loyalty to UCLA and his service to the media were unquestioned during his years as the Bruins’ sports publicist.”
 
Marc’s visit to the CSC convention last summer to pick up his Lifetime Achievement trophy was poignant. It was the first Convention in a while without his wonderful wife, Andra, at his side. After courageously battling a lengthy illness, she passed away in January of 2022.
 
Andra was perhaps the only person who bled Bruin Blue-and-Gold deeper than Marc. He fondly recalls how touched she was when, during her first battle with breast cancer in 2009, head coach Rick Neuheisel presented her with a game ball at a Bruin football practice and the entire team cheered.
 
From the start of their nearly 40 years of marriage, Marc had Andra work in UCLA press boxes and press rooms so he could share his Bruin moments with her. But there was a downside.
 
“Her being there made the job easier for me, but nothing is worse than having to tell your wife that she can’t cheer in the press box,” Dellins noted.
 
And, Andra surely would let out a loud cheer for Marc’s Hall of Fame recognition, with no consequences attached this time.