Barbara Eubanks, B.A. ’96, is accustomed to curious looks from passersby as her cohorts walk around Paris. She understands why Black high school students from the United States stand out during their week-long dives into culture and international travel.
At one café, in April 2022, a woman was intrigued by the students and struck up a conversation with one of them. “She was just curious who we were, and why we were there,” says Eubanks, owner of Going Global With Barbara (GGWB). “One thing led to another, and we found out she’d actually been the chair of the department I’d majored in [Hilary Silver, sociology] at George Washington University. It was a pretty serendipitous, full-circle moment.”
With early dreams of traveling the globe, Eubanks, a native of Pittsburgh’s Hill District, joined the military right after high school. “The recruiter said ‘Join the Navy and see the world,” she recalls. “So, I was all in. Honestly, it was one of the few options being promoted to students of color.”
WASHINGTON – When the motorcoach pulled up to Capital One
Arena on Sunday afternoon, some fans expected the Phoenix Suns to disembark. Instead,
the Virginia Union men’s basketball team ambled out in maroon sweatsuits and assembled
themselves near a side entrance.
The Panthers were making the first of two visits to an NBA
arena this month. On Sunday, they were special guests of the Washington Wizards;
on Feb. 17, Virginia Union will play in the NBA HBCU Classic as part of the All-Star Game festivities
in Indianapolis. The team has grown accustomed to high-profile events, having
played in the HBCU Tip-Off – hosted by NBA star Chris Paul –
the last three seasons.
VUU head coach Jay Butler appreciates the visibility that big games provide and the subsequent rise in interest.
By
the time Jackson State University was founded in 1877, more than three dozen similar institutions already existed. By the
time Deion Sanders became Jackson State’s head football coach, in 2020, the
U.S. Department of Education had identified more
than 100 such institutions – Historically
Black Colleges and Universities.
HBCUs
have produced some of the NFL’s greatest
players, particularly from the 1950s and into
the 1970s, when most Black athletes were prohibited from attending primarily
white schools to play football. Legendary NFL halfback Walter Payton played at Jackson
State in the Southwestern Athletic Conference. Other NFL Hall of Famers from
SWAC schools include Jerry Rice (Mississippi Valley State), Buck Buchannon
(Grambling State) Mel Blount (Southern) and Michael Strahan (Texas Southern), to
name a few.
But as segregation was coming to an end, top Black high school players increasingly attended primarily white institutions, causing HBCU football to fade in prominence. Sanders immediately upset the status quo in December 2021 by signing Travis Hunter, the nation’s No. 1 recruit, who was slated to play at Sanders’ alma mater, Florida State. That was the initial wave of unprecedented media attention on Jackson State and “Coach Prime,” with heightened interest in HBCUs and racial reckoning still rippling through the nation after George Floyd’s murder in 2020.
With all due respect to other NFL quarterbacks – including whoever
goes second – the pecking order is clear aside from their family and friends. The
rest of us won’t hesitate making Patrick Mahomes our first pick at QB if we’re choosing
squads on the playground.
That’s nothing against anyone else, including Baltimore’s
Lamar Jackson, the presumptive MVP who led and followed the Ravens to defeat
against Kansas City on Sunday.
I was rooting for Jackson to get over the hump and reach his
first Super Bowl (ditto for the Detroit Lions later that heartbreaking evening),
and I expected Baltimore to win. The Ravens produced an all-time great regular season, crushing playoff
teams like the Lions, San Francisco 49ers, Miami Dolphins and Houston Texans, while
Jackson escaped injury for a change. It was his time.
But it’s Mahomes’ clock and he’s still winding up.
Just
five months into her tenure with Florida A&M’s women’s bowling team, Capri
Howard must hope the worst is behind her. The beginning couldn’t be much
rockier for a first-year head coach.
Howard
replaced former coach Karen Brown, who retired last year after 11 seasons with the Rattlers. The
program was rocked last month when former FAMU bowler Shamoria Johnson said she
was kicked off
the team for prioritizing her final exams over a scheduled practice. Three
other bowlers left the team in protest of Howard’s decision, which was backed
by athletic director Tiffani-Dawn Sykes.
“In December 2023, Coach Howard dismissed a student-athlete from the bowling team for reasons supported by NCAA Bylaws,” Sykes said in a statement. “Though it’s always challenging to see our student-athletes dismissed, I support the decision by Coach Howard as the proper procedures were taken before the dismissal.”
Scott McKenzie just expected to be recognized for longevity during
a Juniata College event last April.
“I showed because my 20th anniversary was during the
pandemic and they didn’t have the celebration then,” says McKenzie, Juniata’s associate
athletic director for athletic operations since July 2000. “They started
talking about Joanne Krugh and then President Troha put my name and picture on
the screen.
“My first thought was: What the hell am I doing up there?”
With only 32 teams in the NFL, aspiring front-office
professionals can’t be choosy when an opportunity arises. That’s especially true
for Black job seekers, who often only get a shot with fixer-upper franchises like the Detroit Lions.
But when you graduate from an HBCU and work the counter at
Enterprise Rent-A-Car while trying to launch your career, the prospect of shepherding
a perennial loser doesn’t faze you. If all that’s required for a turnaround is
smarts, hard work and a little good fortune, you like your chances. Where do we
sign?
A laughingstock in 2021, the Lions chose Brad Holmes as their executive vice-president and general manager. He became the league’s third Black GM at the time, rewarded for 18 years of service with the St. Louis/Los Angeles Rams. Three years into the job, with Detroit on the brink of its first Super Bowl, it’s safe to say Holmes is crushing it.
Howard
basketball players Seth Towns and Joshua Strong don’t have much in common at
first glance.
Towns
is a 6-foot-9 forward who was a highly recruited prep player out of Columbus,
Ohio. He first attended Harvard, where as a sophomore he was Ivy League Player of
the Year and AP All-America honorable mention.
Strong, from Brooklyn Park, Minnesota, is a 6-foot guard who wound up at Division II Minnesota-Duluth. He was sixth man as a freshman before starting 14 of 36 games as a sophomore, when his team advanced to the NCAA Elite 8.
Like clockwork and without fail, as surely sunset follows
sunrise, each Martin Luther King Day features mass misappropriation from disingenuous
or ignorant white folks.
They cherry-pick his message to find the most palatable, most
nonthreatening quotes and post them on social media like Oklahoma Gov. Kevin
Still, who was kicked off the Tulsa Race Massacre commission in 2021 for signing
a bill that outlawed teaching “critical race theory” in public schools.
“Dr. King’s dream was the American Dream – we’re one nation, under God, with liberty and justice for all,” Stitt tweeted Monday. “He knew that greatness was determined by the content of our character and merit, not skin color or background. MLK’s legacy is forever engraved in history.”
Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, is nicknamed the “Cradle of Coaches” for producing legends like Woody
Hayes, Bo Schembechler, Paul Brown, and other highly successful football
coaches.
Now it’s apparent that the NFL’s Houston Oilers were a crib
for future HBCU coaches.
Texas Southern ended a long, circuitous search on Friday when it named Cris Dishman as its new head football coach. He’ll see two familiar faces at the next coaches’ meeting in the Southwestern Athletic Conference: Prairie View A&M’s Bubba McDowell and Alabama State’s Eddie Robinson Jr.
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