{"id":668787,"date":"2026-03-20T09:03:15","date_gmt":"2026-03-20T09:03:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/668787\/"},"modified":"2026-03-20T09:03:15","modified_gmt":"2026-03-20T09:03:15","slug":"rick-barnes-philadelphia-reunion-started-with-pretzels-in-2007","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/668787\/","title":{"rendered":"Rick Barnes’ Philadelphia reunion started with pretzels in 2007"},"content":{"rendered":"

PHILADELPHIA \u2014<\/strong> Joe<\/strong> Zito<\/strong> meandered his way through a hallway in the underbelly of Xfinity Mobile Arena on Thursday.<\/p>\n

The event staff security person walked in front of the two locker rooms reserved for the teams participating in the Philadelphia portion of the NCAA Tournament. One of them bore a placard with Tennessee basketball<\/a>\u2019s name on it, marking the time and place for Zito. <\/p>\n

He posted himself by the entrance where players and coaches arrived as the final part of the UT travel party trickled in. Then he saw who he was waiting for at the end of the line as Vols coach Rick Barnes<\/a><\/strong> entered the hallway.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs soon as he came in, he came over to me,\u201d Zito said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Barnes strode up to Zito with a beaming grin and an outstretched hand, stretching back 19 years into the past to a connection that began with a Texas game at Villanova and a pretzel delivery.<\/p>\n

How pretzels started a connection for Rick Barnes in Philadelphia<\/p>\n

Barnes walked out of the coaches\u2019 locker room in January 2007 with a question.<\/p>\n

\u201cHey Joe, where are the pretzels?\u201d Barnes inquired<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Barnes and Longhorns came to Philadelphia to play the back half of a home-and-home with Villanova at the then-Wachovia Center.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Zito, who has worked at the arena since it opened in 1996, was assigned security detail outside the locker room, which led to a conversation the day before the game. Barnes hunted a recommendation for a Philly cheesesteak spot. <\/p>\n

Zito offered a different suggestion.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI always thought Philly was cheesesteaks,\u201d Barnes said. \u201cHe asked if I had Philly pretzels before.\u201d<\/p>\n

Barnes had not. Zito told him the pretzels might be better, leading to Barnes\u2019 halftime inquiry about where the pretzels were.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was the first time and the last time,\u201d Zito said. \u201cI don\u2019t remember anybody else asking for pretzels. He wanted them and I got them.\u201d<\/p>\n

The South Philadelphia native dispatched someone to fetch pretzels from Federal Pretzel Company before the end of Texas\u2019 76-69 loss to Villanova. He placed a dozen of them in the locker room for Barnes and his staff.<\/p>\n

Barnes sent his Texas equipment manager out of the locker room to summon Zito following the game. He thanked him for the pretzels and asked if there was anything he could do for him.<\/p>\n

Zito told him no, but Barnes insisted and asked him for his address and his kids\u2019 names with a promise to send something to them.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know he didn\u2019t think I would, but I did,\u201d Barnes said.<\/p>\n

Joe Zito still roots for Rick Barnes and was rooting for a March reunion <\/p>\n

Zito has a Texas T-shirt he stills wears. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I go out to places, people go, \u2018Hook \u2018em, Horns,\u2019 \u201d Zito said. \u201cI have nothing to do with Texas.\u201d<\/p>\n

A large box arrived at the Zito residence a few months after Texas played Villanova, which puzzled Zito and his family. <\/p>\n

\u201cMy wife is yelling at me, \u2018We\u2019ve got this big box in the mail from Austin, Texas,\u2019 \u201d Zito said. \u201cI said, \u201cAustin, Texas? I don\u2019t know what it is.\u2019 \u201d<\/p>\n

Barnes followed through on his promise to thank the Zitos for the pretzels. He sent Texas shirts and apparel for Zito, his wife and his kids. It included the shirt that Zito still wears. He has gotten comments anywhere from the grocery store to the casino. People ask him which part of Texas he is from.<\/p>\n

The package also included a card thanking Zito and it had Barnes\u2019 email on it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI emailed him and said, \u2018Thank you for the box, I will see you down the road,\u2019 \u201d Zito said.<\/p>\n

Zito hoped that would be this March. He has watched Barnes coach at Texas and at Tennessee ever since they met in 2007. He knew Philadelphia was a potential landing spot for the Vols, but he couldn\u2019t watch the selection show. He was working the Philadelphia 76ers\u2019 109-103 win against the Portland Trailblazers on Sunday.<\/p>\n

He asked for updates from people, wanting to know if Tennessee was coming. Finally, someone confirmed it and Zito started thinking about the reunion that came Thursday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Zito let Barnes know they were born two weeks apart in 1954. Barnes said that means they are young and Zito said it\u2019s why they must get along so well.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Barnes asked again for a cheesesteak recommendation, which Zito gave.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m going to wait for your pretzels, too,\u201d Barnes said.<\/p>\n

Zito was already on it. He will have them for Barnes on Friday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cHe wants them tomorrow,\u201d Zito said. \u201cHe already told me.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PHILADELPHIA \u2014 Joe Zito meandered his way through a hallway in the underbelly of Xfinity Mobile Arena on…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":668788,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5132],"tags":[5229,1448,2830,1311,1718,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-668787","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-pa","10":"tag-pennsylvania","11":"tag-philadelphia","12":"tag-regwall","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-united-states-of-america","15":"tag-unitedstates","16":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","17":"tag-us","18":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116260700630975809","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668787","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=668787"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668787\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/668788"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=668787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=668787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=668787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}