The NCAA Needs to It's Own Version of the Rooney Rule
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Maximus Rex
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The Rooney Rule http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/story/_/id/9488105/black-coaches-college-hoops-decline-figure-why-college-basketball
The rule is named after Dan Rooney, the owner of the Pittsburgh Steelers and the chairman of the league's diversity committee, and indirectly the Rooney family in general, due to the Steelers' long history of giving African Americans opportunities to serve in team leadership roles.
It was created as a reaction to the 2002 firings of head coaches Tony Dungy of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Dennis Green of the Minnesota Vikings, at a time when Dungy had a winning record and Green had just had his first losing season in ten years. Shortly afterwards, U.S. civil rights attorneys Cyrus Mehri and Johnny Cochran released a study showing that black head coaches, despite winning a higher percentage of games, were less likely to be hired and more likely to be fired than their white counterparts. Former NFL players Kellen Winslow and John Wooten then put together a self-described “affinity group” of minority scouts, coaches, and front-office personnel, to advocate for the rule's creation.[4]
Its purpose was to ensure that minority coaches, especially African Americans, would be considered for high-level coaching positions.
College hoops' black coaching issue
Fewer African-American coaches are getting jobs, and it's time to find out why
To reach Shaka Smart's level, black coaches often have to overcome certain labels.
When a national sportswriter calls to talk about minority hiring in college basketball, folks of all races seem to get nervous.
As I sought feedback following last week's release of the "2012 Racial and Gender Report Card: College Sport" by Central Florida's Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport -- the report excludes historically black colleges and universities -- which states that the current pool of Division I African-American head coaches (18.6 percent through the 2011-12 season) is at its lowest mark since the 1995-96 season, people weren't sure what, if anything, they should say.
Multiple administrators passed on the opportunity. The NCAA wanted to see my questions, and then it wanted a pre-interview phone conversation before it ultimately emailed its responses.
The coaches who talked on the record always ended our chats with the same concern: "I didn't say anything that will make me look bad, right?"
I don't blame them. It's an incendiary issue, because we're uncomfortable with race as dialogue.
It's still a subject that makes athletic directors -- 89 percent of whom are white at the Division I level, per the report -- squirm. Minority coaches speak cautiously, because they don't want to be labeled as rebels or militants.
That hesitancy is a significant component in a perennial problem that's often managed but rarely attacked. An inherent defensiveness makes the subject difficult to publicly dissect. So year after year, the issue remains.
The numbers aren't too surprising, but they're worth addressing, especially when the coaching pool belies the fact that 57.2 percent of Division I men's basketball players are African-American.
"After it appeared that we had made some progress when it came to hiring men's basketball coaches of color, it's apparent from this report that progress has slowed or stopped all together, and that's incredibly disappointing," said Notre Dame women's associate head coach Carol Owens, president of the Black Coaches Association. "Not so long ago, it was the trendy thing to hire coaches of color, but I believe that those in the decision-making apparatus have turned their backs on those they were so eager to hire just a few years earlier."
Perhaps it's that simple, but I believe the dilemma is more complicated than that.
Iowa assistant Andrew Francis is an African-American who wants to lead his own Division I program one day. But like his peers, he's not seeking an easy path, just an opportunity.
He had one when Siena interviewed him for a position that was ultimately filled by Jimmy Patsos earlier this year. As he prepared for the interview, Francis had concerns about his lack of head-coaching experience, not his race.
"I think that's one of the biggest hurdles," he said. "That was the one thing that kept pressing in my mind. It wasn't that I'm a black guy interviewing for this job."
But acquiring that first job is a constant challenge for many black assistants. Perception could be part of the problem. Francis, and multiple others, referenced the idea that too many black assistants are viewed as solid recruiters but not necessarily men who can run programs.
"For a long time, if you look at a lot of successful African-American assistants, they were known for being what? Recruiters," said Francis, who praised Iowa's Fran McCaffery for his mentorship and guidance. "But you have to know a lot more than recruiting to run a program."
VCU's Shaka Smart added, "When that [recruiter] label occurs, now you get to the hiring process with the athletic director, and if he's influenced or impacted at all by that label, he's going to be less likely to hire that assistant coach, even though the truth is much different from the label."
No athletic director, university president or trustee will admit that "labels" affect hiring. And there's probably no way to prove it.
But the data suggests that black assistants have hit a ceiling in college basketball. The only way to change the current climate is to create avenues for worthy black candidates to prove their value to athletic directors and other administrators.
That demands relationships -- relationships that have been difficult for some minority coaches to forge.
"I think the biggest frustration was just trying to get a foot in the door, whether it's an interview or just getting involved and getting into the mix," said Charlotte coach Alan Major.
That mix is usually concocted by powerful men (and a few women) who are mostly white. They all want to win, and their job is to find a person who can do that.
In major college football and basketball, the job security of an athletic director is tied to the success of their most recent hires in those sports. So they all want qualified candidates. That's the chief objective.
The SEC has taken a lead in providing opportunities to black coaches like MSU's Rick Ray.
But according to the numbers, they often choose what's familiar, too. And black isn't always familiar.
That's the barrier that Major and others referenced. Cultural divides factor into hiring, because administrators often rely on personal connections for recommendations. Sometimes those confidants fit similar profiles and thrive in similar social/professional circles, which may limit the chances of a minority candidate emerging in the hiring process.
The rule is named after Dan Rooney, the owner of the Pittsburgh Steelers and the chairman of the league's diversity committee, and indirectly the Rooney family in general, due to the Steelers' long history of giving African Americans opportunities to serve in team leadership roles.
It was created as a reaction to the 2002 firings of head coaches Tony Dungy of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Dennis Green of the Minnesota Vikings, at a time when Dungy had a winning record and Green had just had his first losing season in ten years. Shortly afterwards, U.S. civil rights attorneys Cyrus Mehri and Johnny Cochran released a study showing that black head coaches, despite winning a higher percentage of games, were less likely to be hired and more likely to be fired than their white counterparts. Former NFL players Kellen Winslow and John Wooten then put together a self-described “affinity group” of minority scouts, coaches, and front-office personnel, to advocate for the rule's creation.[4]
Its purpose was to ensure that minority coaches, especially African Americans, would be considered for high-level coaching positions.
College hoops' black coaching issue
Fewer African-American coaches are getting jobs, and it's time to find out why
To reach Shaka Smart's level, black coaches often have to overcome certain labels.
When a national sportswriter calls to talk about minority hiring in college basketball, folks of all races seem to get nervous.
As I sought feedback following last week's release of the "2012 Racial and Gender Report Card: College Sport" by Central Florida's Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport -- the report excludes historically black colleges and universities -- which states that the current pool of Division I African-American head coaches (18.6 percent through the 2011-12 season) is at its lowest mark since the 1995-96 season, people weren't sure what, if anything, they should say.
Multiple administrators passed on the opportunity. The NCAA wanted to see my questions, and then it wanted a pre-interview phone conversation before it ultimately emailed its responses.
The coaches who talked on the record always ended our chats with the same concern: "I didn't say anything that will make me look bad, right?"
I don't blame them. It's an incendiary issue, because we're uncomfortable with race as dialogue.
It's still a subject that makes athletic directors -- 89 percent of whom are white at the Division I level, per the report -- squirm. Minority coaches speak cautiously, because they don't want to be labeled as rebels or militants.
That hesitancy is a significant component in a perennial problem that's often managed but rarely attacked. An inherent defensiveness makes the subject difficult to publicly dissect. So year after year, the issue remains.
The numbers aren't too surprising, but they're worth addressing, especially when the coaching pool belies the fact that 57.2 percent of Division I men's basketball players are African-American.
"After it appeared that we had made some progress when it came to hiring men's basketball coaches of color, it's apparent from this report that progress has slowed or stopped all together, and that's incredibly disappointing," said Notre Dame women's associate head coach Carol Owens, president of the Black Coaches Association. "Not so long ago, it was the trendy thing to hire coaches of color, but I believe that those in the decision-making apparatus have turned their backs on those they were so eager to hire just a few years earlier."
Perhaps it's that simple, but I believe the dilemma is more complicated than that.
Iowa assistant Andrew Francis is an African-American who wants to lead his own Division I program one day. But like his peers, he's not seeking an easy path, just an opportunity.
He had one when Siena interviewed him for a position that was ultimately filled by Jimmy Patsos earlier this year. As he prepared for the interview, Francis had concerns about his lack of head-coaching experience, not his race.
"I think that's one of the biggest hurdles," he said. "That was the one thing that kept pressing in my mind. It wasn't that I'm a black guy interviewing for this job."
But acquiring that first job is a constant challenge for many black assistants. Perception could be part of the problem. Francis, and multiple others, referenced the idea that too many black assistants are viewed as solid recruiters but not necessarily men who can run programs.
"For a long time, if you look at a lot of successful African-American assistants, they were known for being what? Recruiters," said Francis, who praised Iowa's Fran McCaffery for his mentorship and guidance. "But you have to know a lot more than recruiting to run a program."
VCU's Shaka Smart added, "When that [recruiter] label occurs, now you get to the hiring process with the athletic director, and if he's influenced or impacted at all by that label, he's going to be less likely to hire that assistant coach, even though the truth is much different from the label."
No athletic director, university president or trustee will admit that "labels" affect hiring. And there's probably no way to prove it.
But the data suggests that black assistants have hit a ceiling in college basketball. The only way to change the current climate is to create avenues for worthy black candidates to prove their value to athletic directors and other administrators.
That demands relationships -- relationships that have been difficult for some minority coaches to forge.
"I think the biggest frustration was just trying to get a foot in the door, whether it's an interview or just getting involved and getting into the mix," said Charlotte coach Alan Major.
That mix is usually concocted by powerful men (and a few women) who are mostly white. They all want to win, and their job is to find a person who can do that.
In major college football and basketball, the job security of an athletic director is tied to the success of their most recent hires in those sports. So they all want qualified candidates. That's the chief objective.
The SEC has taken a lead in providing opportunities to black coaches like MSU's Rick Ray.
But according to the numbers, they often choose what's familiar, too. And black isn't always familiar.
That's the barrier that Major and others referenced. Cultural divides factor into hiring, because administrators often rely on personal connections for recommendations. Sometimes those confidants fit similar profiles and thrive in similar social/professional circles, which may limit the chances of a minority candidate emerging in the hiring process.
Comments
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It's called the homologous production theory, says Mark Daigneault. He's an assistant to Florida coach Billy Donovan (not an assistant coach) who has studied treatment discrimination in men's college basketball coaching through the sports management program at the University of Florida.
People tend to surround themselves with folks of similar races and backgrounds, he said. The potential ramifications of that theory in collegiate sports, per Daigneault, are uniform athletic departments and coaching staffs.
"If white administrators are more likely to network with and surround themselves with people like them, and the majority of them are white and male, then that's going to show up somewhere in the hiring process," he said.
Scott Stricklin said he wasn't looking for a minority coach when he hired Rick Ray to run Mississippi State's men's basketball program last year.
Stricklin, the university's athletic director, has helped the SEC become the nation's most diverse conference in major Division I men's basketball (seven of the league's head coaches are African-American, one is Hispanic). But before he made the choice, Stricklin turned to people he trusted. That's the norm, he said.
"It's like any job search. You call people you trust and respect to get their input," Stricklin said. "Whether I'm hiring a ticket manager or I'm hiring a head football coach, I'm going to call people I trust in that area and say, 'Hey, give me some names.' So if there's any accusation of a good ol' boy system, I guess that leads to it, but I don't know how else you get a read on people unless you ask other people who've viewed them in a setting where they weren't trying to get your job. You're going to rely on people you trust to get a recommendation."
That's a smart move for Stricklin and his colleagues throughout the country. In college sports, however, the preferred method may constrict the hiring pool, even for the administrators who desire more diversity in their respective departments.
It's not that simple, though. Stricklin said it's rare to see minorities in athletic departments who have long-term goals of becoming athletic directors.
Every person I interviewed for this column concurred.
They also agreed that addressing the lack of diversity within the Division I administrative ranks is just as important as the problem in coaching.
But Oregon State coach Craig Robinson said it might be challenging for athletic departments to attract desirable minority candidates because they might have more fruitful options elsewhere.
"For a while, [corporate America] was only hiring Ivy League-educated and top-10 business school black folks, and if you're just looking for those folks to be athletic directors, you're not going to find them, because they can make more money being lawyers and doctors and investment bankers," he said. "So you have to either groom your own or you have to take a flyer on somebody whose résumé might not be exactly what would make you the most comfortable."
The greatest obstacle within this entire quandary appears to be the absence of a fortified and proven bridge between qualified black men's basketball coaching candidates and predominately white administrators.
Sure, programs like the Villa 7 certainly help. But more sweeping adjustments might be warranted to truly disrupt the status quo.
That's why Dr. Richard Lapchick, author of the annual report card, recommends the Eddie Robinson Rule, college athletics' version of the NFL's Rooney Rule.
Lapchick, who has analyzed diversity issues in sports for nearly 50 years, said the rule would require schools to interview minorities for vacancies, which would spur progress.
"Anywhere that's been put in place, it has made things better because it just opens the hiring process," he said. "You're gonna get bogus interviews for sure, but more than likely the case is going to be even if you had no intentions of hiring that person, if they come in and they're impressive, which happens consistently in the NFL, people in the organization ... they'll remember that person."
It's a promising idea, but who would regulate the rule? The NCAA is not built like the NFL. Unless its membership agreed to it, the NCAA alone could not enforce such a requirement.
"The NCAA is a membership organization, so our colleges and universities would have to endorse such an initiative to take effect, and I don't know from a legal perspective if the NCAA could mandate that policy for all schools to follow since campus policies are determined by each college and university," said Bernard Franklin, NCAA executive vice president and chief inclusion officer, via email. "The NCAA is structured and governed differently than a league. Also, we need to understand that having a diverse pool of candidates for interviewing is imperative, but interviewing is not hiring. The issue doesn't always rest solely with interviewing, but with actual hiring."
I don't have the answers. There are clearly many layers to the issues.
But the dialogue surrounding them has been too discreet and too quiet for too long. Instead of whispering, we should scream if diversity within men's basketball and college sports is genuinely significant to us.
Fear, however, is a silencer. A broad and open discussion about this sensitive topic could facilitate change.
"One of the simplest solutions you can have is just having a dialogue or awareness about the issue," Daigneault said.
But every time folks are asked to come to the table to discuss race and its role in hiring at this level, few grab chairs.
And that's our biggest problem.
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Missing Men: The Lack of African-American Head Coaches in College Football
http://diverseeducation.com/article/51061/
by Dr. Matthew Lynch
College football is arguably the most popular sport at the nation’s colleges and universities. Bringing in more than $90 million annually in revenue at the highest grossing University of Texas, it is no wonder that school leaders view the football team as less of an extracurricular activity and more of a moneymaker. The revenue that is generated by college football programs only represents a small piece of the overall financial benefits. Schools with strong athletic programs, particularly in the area of football, bring in more prospective students and have larger booster groups in place.
Like every area of higher education, finding the right blend of diversity on the football field is a challenge. Take Charlie Strong, for example. The coach of Louisville that led the team to victory in the Sugar Bowl was an assistant for a whopping 27 years before finally being given a head coaching opportunity. In just two seasons, he produced a bowl-worthy squad and began receiving offers from other schools, like Tennessee. Strong insists that he will not leave Louisville because of his loyalty to his superiors but is there more to it than that?
The Facts
Not many African-American head coaches at the college level have had the same success as Strong—mainly because many have not been given the chance. Of the 124 Division 1-A college football schools, only 15 had African-American coaches in the 2012 season, according to an executive report by the Black Coaches Association. The Big Ten conference has seen zero Black head coaches in the past 10 years.
While head coaches are the most visible, support positions are severely underrepresented as well. Only 312 of 1,018 of college football assistant coaches are Black, and only 31 of 255 of offensive and defensive coordinators are African-American. Combined, Black football coaches and support staff represent a measly 5 percent of Football Bowl Subdivision numbers.
At Division II and Division III schools, diversity is even worse. The Black Coaches Association reports that, in the 2012 season, only nine schools of 113 in these two categories had head coaches of color. These numbers exclude historically Black universities.
The Problem
Despite the thousands of Black college football players in recent decades, barely a handful has been trusted with leading teams. These ex-players obviously understand the game and know what college athletes face on the field—so what gives?
Part of the problem is that schools are quick to dismiss coaches of all backgrounds when immediate improvement does not take place. The most recent high-profile example was the firing of Jon Embree by the University of Colorado in November. Floyd Keith of the Black Coaches Association called the firing a “disappointment” and wished that the school had given Embree a third season to prove himself. The school pointed to a 4-21 record over the course of two seasons as the reason for the firing, but critics, like Keith, say that just two years is simply not enough time to turn a team around.
Many critics are also quick to point out that White coaches with bad numbers are often still considered a hot commodity by other schools when they are on the market, whereas Black coaches have historically been given just one shot to prove their talent.
It is also important to note that a college football coach does not have the same responsibilities as an NFL one. Winning is valuable to the university, but so are other aspects like graduation rates of players and team conduct. Both play an indirect role in the revenue the school is able to generate in future years by attracting new students. Yet with turnover rates of all college coaches rising every football season, a shift toward a “winning takes place on the field” mentality is evident.
Solutions
The statistics are indisputable when it comes to underrepresentation of African-Americans in all levels of college football coaching. With so much being said about this issue, not much in the way of problem solving has arisen.
Colleges and universities would do well to take a cue from the NFL when it comes to hiring minority coaches. Established in 2003, the Rooney Rule requires NFL teams to interview at least one minority candidate for all vacant head coaching positions and other executive football operation spots. After just three seasons, the Rooney Rule led to an increase of 22 percent in the number of African-American head coaches in the NFL, and those numbers rise every season. A similar rule only makes sense in a college athletic setting, especially since so many other aspects of higher education use affirmative action programs to bolster diversity and opportunity.
Another possible option is for schools to set up coaching mentorship programs for minority players that show leadership potential. An even better approach would be an NCAA-sanctioned program that seeks talented players and gives them some exposure to coaching and maybe even a certificate program. These earmarked players could then begin working their way through the coaching ranks sooner and have a common knowledge base.
All changes need to be initiated by the NCAA, college athletics governing body. For a real dynamic shift to be felt across the board, every school needs to have the same diversity opportunities and rules as all the others. It is not enough to wish that more schools took a closer look at African-Americans to fill head football coaching spots; an overarching game plan needs to be in place for true change to occur.
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I've always hated when people reject you for not having enough experience. How am I supposed to get the necessary experience if you won't give me a shot?
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and I think of the 120 D I programs that there aren't any black athletic directors. From what I read the NCAA legally can't enact it's on version of the Rooney Rule, however (just as the NCAA put pressure on schools to stop using native Americas as mascots, they can implement a program that would increase the opportunity for African American coaches. Considering the large percentage of of black student athletes that play for these schools, there should be somebody on the coaching staff that looks like them.
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I've always hated when people reject you for not having enough experience. How am I supposed to get the necessary experience if you won't give me a shot?
Co-Mothafuk'n Sign -
I've always hated when people reject you for not having enough experience. How am I supposed to get the necessary experience if you won't give me a shot?
Bruh, nobody wants to pay for you getting experience on their dime. This is the first harsh lesson you get out of college
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Black people need to stop relying on white people to do right. This problem can be solve if the top recruits go to school where black coaches are!
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I've always hated when people reject you for not having enough experience. How am I supposed to get the necessary experience if you won't give me a shot?
on the job training or course training before the job always seemed like it would be more efficient for a company to implement...rather than go after the few people who have experience and to pass on the tons of people who have potential and the will to learn
anyway I dint know kellen winslow had his hands in that -
Nah its time to find ways around it.
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we talking about kellen winslow sr right?
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The Rooney Rule is good in theory, but it's really just lip service for the most part.
Basically owners go through the motions of interviewing black candidates because they "have to"....but most of the time they already know who they're gonna hire beforehand.
So, the interview isn't really an interview.
They're just going through the motions to satisfy the Rooney Rule.
Same thing would probably happen if the NCAA had a similar rule. -
En-Fuego22 wrote: »Black people need to stop relying on white people to do right. This problem can be solve if the top recruits go to school where black coaches are!
Always said ? should stop doing these institutions favors
and start going to hbcu schools to play. -
En-Fuego22 wrote: »Black people need to stop relying on white people to do right. This problem can be solve if the top recruits go to school where black coaches are!
We could shut ? down if all of our recruits went to Texas Southern, Alabama State and AnM, Prarie View, Famu, Southern, Grambling, Jackson State and so on. The revenue for the schools would be huge, the bands are already superior, and we can groom our own coaches and players. Not only that, we could separate from the Ncaa and create our faction, with our own rules. -
Black_Excellence wrote: »En-Fuego22 wrote: »Black people need to stop relying on white people to do right. This problem can be solve if the top recruits go to school where black coaches are!
Always said ? should stop doing these institutions favors
and start going to hbcu schools to play.
Said this in a post a few weeks ago. Those so called big time D-1 programs are only considered big time because of the black athletes that go there.
Parenting and mind manipulation is a bigger part of this problem. Too many parents just see the "$$$" their kids can bring them and allow them to retire.
We as black people from birth are taught and conditioned to think white is right. They are who most of see damn near always in postions of authority.
The book "40 Million Dollar Slaves" explains how young black athletes are pushed towards white men leading them early in life. -
En-Fuego22 wrote: »Black people need to stop relying on white people to do right. This problem can be solve if the top recruits go to school where black coaches are!
We could shut ? down if all of our recruits went to Texas Southern, Alabama State and AnM, Prarie View, Famu, Southern, Grambling, Jackson State and so on. The revenue for the schools would be huge, the bands are already superior, and we can groom our own coaches and players. Not only that, we could separate from the Ncaa and create our faction, with our own rules.
Aww man that would be so dope.I hear alot of PWC playing neck now they even copy our bands. -
Black_Excellence wrote: »En-Fuego22 wrote: »Black people need to stop relying on white people to do right. This problem can be solve if the top recruits go to school where black coaches are!
Always said ? should stop doing these institutions favors
and start going to hbcu schools to play.
Its coming, a top football recruit had Southern in his final list of schools before committing to Alabama this past year. He was rated 4 stars on Rivals I think.
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That's a hell of an article
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Black_Excellence wrote: »En-Fuego22 wrote: »Black people need to stop relying on white people to do right. This problem can be solve if the top recruits go to school where black coaches are!
Always said ? should stop doing these institutions favors
and start going to hbcu schools to play.
Its coming, a top football recruit had Southern in his final list of schools before committing to Alabama this past year. He was rated 4 stars on Rivals I think.
Yeah, but he didnt go. I know you could put Grambling St. football program up against any fbs school and their resume would be more impressive.I rep The Texas Longhorns but id support an hbcu school (prolly southern) cause ive had relatives go their and say the school itself is a good school...so I would love it if alot of these black 5 star, 4-star, even 3 star recruits started playing for historically black college football teams who also have great football history and oh yeah were also the same schools who blacks played for back when these schools that they're breaking their necks to play for now didnt even want blacks on the team. -
En-Fuego22 wrote: »Black people need to stop relying on white people to do right. This problem can be solve if the top recruits go to school where black coaches are!
We could shut ? down if all of our recruits went to Texas Southern, Alabama State and AnM, Prarie View, Famu, Southern, Grambling, Jackson State and so on. The revenue for the schools would be huge, the bands are already superior, and we can groom our own coaches and players. Not only that, we could separate from the Ncaa and create our faction, with our own rules.
MONEY
SHOE DEALS
FAME
...the big white schools can offer those three things to these black kids. And thats what they want. Aint a lot of Marcus Garveys playing college ball bruh. These are really young dudes who mostly aren't all that bright lets just be honest) and just thinking about helping their Mama out and ? any white ? of their choice. Last thing on their mind is how can they help black coaches in the NCAA. -
@Darc ....thats sad but true and thats why i think it'll stay that way and NEVER change.
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Black_Excellence wrote: »Black_Excellence wrote: »En-Fuego22 wrote: »Black people need to stop relying on white people to do right. This problem can be solve if the top recruits go to school where black coaches are!
Always said ? should stop doing these institutions favors
and start going to hbcu schools to play.
Its coming, a top football recruit had Southern in his final list of schools before committing to Alabama this past year. He was rated 4 stars on Rivals I think.
Yeah, but he didnt go. I know you could put Grambling St. football program up against any fbs school and their resume would be more impressive.I rep The Texas Longhorns but id support an hbcu school (prolly southern) cause ive had relatives go their and say the school itself is a good school...so I would love it if alot of these black 5 star, 4-star, even 3 star recruits started playing for historically black college football teams who also have great football history and oh yeah were also the same schools who blacks played for back when these schools that they're breaking their necks to play for now didnt even want blacks on the team.
Not until they saw how we changed the game and how much money we can make for them. Don't get it twisted, a lot of those schools wouldn't want us attending their campuses now if we aren't helping them earn millions and win games on their teams. I know fans don't have a problem going in and calling players out of their names whenever they don't play well. -
Darth Sidious wrote: »
U ain't lying
I'm not even working in the field I have my degree in for that reason -
Most of those athletes trying to go professional, a big time program gives them a better opportunity to make it to whatever pro-league they are trying out for.
Beside HBCUs are mostly funded by whites anyway, that's why so many of them are so conservative.
The fact is you need more blacks at every level, not just coaches but athletic directors, deans etc.
