College Football: No more excuses, time to hire more black head coaches

Not only is there an issue with hiring black head coaches, but there is also an issue with black assistants given more opportunities to become coordinators.

It stands to reason there is a quantum leap between being a coordinator and a head coach. That said, every head coach got their first opportunity somewhere. As mentioned earlier, hiring a head coach –especially one with no prior experience– is a crapshoot. What black coaches want is the same thing their white colleagues have; an opportunity to fail.

Of all the issues regarding the lack of diversity of head coaches are the pipeline of black assistants and position coaches allowed to move up from position coaches to coordinators.

There are just five offensive coordinators in the Power Five and seven defensive coordinators. On the other hand, there are 49 running backs coaches in the Power Five. Nearly 30 years ago (1992) there were four coordinators.

Many schools have the black assistant coach to mentor the black players; those coaches have the task of assisting these young black men in navigating a predominantly white world –something many of these young men have no experience with– while their white counterparts can hone their craft. There needs to be more opportunity for black position coaches to become coordinators.

There is a glimmer of hope

In recent seasons, there has been an uptick in “recycled” black coaches. Tyrone Willingham –now retired– was one of the first black coaches to be re-treaded coaching Stanford, Notre Dame and Washington. Charlie Strong’s first head coaching job was at Louisville.

That success was parlayed into the head coaching job at Texas. Strong was fired but ended up at South Florida. The two most recent examples –Kevin Sumlin and Willie Taggart have also had three coaching stops.

Jimmy Lake, promoted at Washington, was the first “coach in waiting” hired since James Franklin at Maryland –though that did not turn out as planned for Franklin at Maryland.

All of these opportunities have happened since 2015. Before 2015, Randy Shannon, Sylvester Croom, and Ruffin McNeil never received second chances. Former Colorado head coach Jon Embree stated in his presser after being fired in 2012, “We don’t get second chances.”

This all boils down to simple; black assistants and coordinators deserve the same opportunities as their white colleagues. There is always a story as to why the black coach isn’t hired or promoted. The issue is not qualifications; the coaches universities hire are qualified –or at least deemed to be by the school– to be a head coach.

The problem is equity and bias. As the numbers tell, if the school interviews a qualified white coach, the qualified black coach is not hired.

That does not seem to be changing en masse anytime soon.