Number of black head football coaches at major colleges shrinks to four

With the firings in recent weeks of Washington's Tyrone Willingham and Kansas State's Ron Prince, just four black head coaches remain: Mississippi State's Sylvester Croom, Buffalo's Turner Gill, Miami's Randy Shannon and Houston's Kevin Sumlin.

It is the smallest number since 1993, when three African Americans held top coaching posts in what is now called the Football Bowl Subdivision.

"It stands in such contrast to the optimism a few days ago when America elected its first African American president," said Richard Lapchick, co-author of the study, which was released by the Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sports at the University of Central Florida. "Not to compare the two [situations], but to slide back to such a low number at this time has to be bad news for college sports."

The researchers polled all 119 universities in the bowl subdivision, asking the ethnicity of coaches, athletic directors, presidents, faculty, players and NCAA faculty representatives. According to the report, 56% of college athletes are minorities while 91% of athletic directors and presidents are white. Minority representation in all categories increased last year by less than 1%.

"I found it appalling. It's extremely disturbing in light of the fact there are a wealth of African American coordinators and a vast majority of football players are African American," said Charlotte Westerhaus, the NCAA's vice president for diversity and inclusion.

The study found that 12.2% of the 255 offensive and defensive coordinators are African American. USC running backs coach Todd McNair and linebackers coach Ken Norton Jr. are black. So are UCLA defensive line coach Todd Howard and defensive coordinator DeWayne Walker.

Walker was an associate head coach at USC and has held assistant spots with such NFL teams as the Washington Redskins, New York Giants and New England Patriots. The last few years his name has popped up in relation to several openings, including the job at UCLA that ultimately went to Rick Neuheisel.

Before practice Thursday, Walker said minority coaches aren't asking anyone to give them jobs, just a chance to interview.