Black Coaches Suffer From 'Whispering Reality' in College Football
Black players now occupy nearly half of all roster spots in major college football. But Black coaches remain in short supply, with only a third of teams having Black head coaches.
More than five decades after Black players were allowed to join major college football teams in the American South, they now occupy nearly half of all roster spots with a record 9,617 participants. According to NCAA statistics, this is proof that racial integration has finally worked. Just not for coaches.
Out of 136 teams in major college football, only 13 have Black head coaches, down from 17 out of 120 teams in 2011. Of the 34 head coaches in the NCAA's powerful Big Ten and Southeastern conferences, 33 are White. (Maryland's Mike Locksley is the only Black head coach in the two leagues.
) The SEC hasn't had a non-interim Black head coach since 2020. To get a better understanding of this issue, USA TODAY Sports spoke with Black former NFL stars hired as head coaches at lower-resource levels of college football who are trying to break through in a different way — Marshall Faulk, Eddie George, and Michael Vick. They have strong opinions.
'Football's the only sport that players struggle to come off the field and become a coach,' said Faulk, a Pro Football Hall of Famer currently the head coach at Southern University in Louisiana. 'They look at us like if you're successful at the game playing then you won't be successful at the game in any other capacity. ' It often comes down to comfort, a word that kept coming up with these former players.