Officiating has taken Selma Mayor George Evans all around the country. He’s officiated NCAA Tournament games involving legendary coaches, including Bobby Knight, Jim Boeheim and John Calipari.

He’s officated an Elite Eight game, which is one of college basketball’s biggest contests.

Now, officiating has taken him all the way to the Southwestern Athletic Conference Hall of Fame. Evans was one of seven inducted during a ceremony held earlier this month in Houston, Texas.

“I never dreamed of that,” Evans said. “I never expected to be into the Hall of Fame for the SWAC.”

Evans said it was a humbling experience. It’s not often officials get recognized for their work on the court. Most of the time the best officials find a way to stay out of the headlines and do not impact the final result of a game, so he was surprised to find out the SWAC wanted to honor him.

Given all his accomplishments, he probably shouldn’t have been.

He spent 30 years officiating SWAC games and served as the conference’s director of men’s and women’s officials for over a decade. Evans started officiating in 1968 and said he still grades officials for the Southeastern Conference at University of Alabama home basketball games.

“The SWAC was the building block for all that,” Evans said. “The high school games were instrumental because I got started. Then I went to the college level and Division I. SWAC was my first Division I conference to work in and I went on from there to the Sun Belt and SEC and Conference USA and Big 12.”

One of his favorite stories is calling a 1991 NCAA Tournament game between Indiana and Coastal Carolina at Louisville’s Freedom Hall. Bobby Knight, one of the most intimidating basketball coaches of all-time, coached Indiana at that time.

Before the game, Evans said he was warned what to expect from Knight, but only was asked about a call once the entire game. Knight wanted traveling called, but Evans disagreed.

“Everybody was telling me to be careful with Bobby and if he asks a question to please answer him because if not he’ll ask some more, ask some more and then go crazy,” Evans said. “I didn’t have a problem.”

He also called a first round game in 1989 between Syracuse and Bucknell, which featured Boeheim, and a 1993 contest between Calipari-coached Massachusetts and Virginia.

“You name it, I had the experience,” Evans said. “I’ve been blessed.”

Evans laughs about some of the funny things coaches said to him through the years. Being an official taught him how to tune things out and he said it prepared him for his time in politics.

“It taught me a lot about noise because in those arenas you go to you’ve got 8,000, 9,000 or 10,000 people, and they are yelling all the time so you have to tune them out,” Evans said. “In politics, there’s a time when you have to hear and not hear and I think it conditioned me for what I’m doing now.”

Like officiating, being mayor there’s a lot of pressure. Sometimes every call won’t be the right one.

“People are going to disagree and people are going to agree,” Evans said. “You have to find ways to do what you believe is right and not worry about whether they agree or disagree and just do it right. In the end it always generally balances out.”

Evans said many officials he called games with attended the ceremony, which was held at the J.W. Marriott Hotel in Houston.

He said many officials he called games with in the SWAC are now officiating in the NBA. He said he’s still in contact with some of them.

“A lot of officials that work Division I games now came through the SWAC,” Evans said.

“There’s about eight officials initially that came through the SWAC and went to the NBA. Five are still there in the NBA now that got their start in the SWAC.”

The induction ceremony was held at the J.W. Marriott Hotel in Houston. Evans said he and the other inductees were honored during the SWAC Football Championship between Alcorn State and Grambling State that weekend too.

The other inductees were Tommy Gibbs, Kevin Granger, Perry Harrington, Maurice Hurst, Alicia Pete and Steve Rogers Jr.